THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 

GIFT  OF 


Estate  of  Duren  J.H.  Ward 


A    RECEIVERSHIP   P^OR    CIVILIZATION 


By  DUREN  J.   H.    WARD 

A.B.,  B.D.,  A.M.,  (Hillsdale); 
A.M.  (Harvard) ;  Ph.D.  (Leipsic) 

Our  Next  Emancipation, 

{The  Temperance  Movement,  i88j) 

How  Religion  Arises 

The  Classification  of  Religions 

The  Human  Races 

A  Historic o-Ethnological  Classification 

Anthropology 

A  Syllabus  of  the  Science 

The  Problem  of  the  Mounds,  Etc. 

The  Meskwaki  Tribe 

Government    Ownership    in    the    Hundred 
Principal  Countries,  Etc. 


A  RECEIVERSHIP 
FOR   CIVILIZATION 

From  Biblical  Church  with  its  Primitive  World 
and  Jewish  Legends  to  Aryan  Science  with 
its    Infinite    Universe    and    Established    Facts 


By 
DUREN  J.     H.    WARD 


Boston 

The  Four  Seas  Company 

Publishers 


Copyright,  ip22,  by 
Thil  Four  Seas  Company 


The     Four     Seas     Press 
Boston,    Mass.,   U.    S.    A. 


DEDICATION 

To  Men  of  Religion 
The  World's  former  Trust,  the  time-honored  source  of  goodness; 

To  Men  of  Science 
The  World's  now  hope,  the  modern  fount  of  knowledge. 

May  the  one  get  the  facts  and  the  other  the 

zeal  that  shall  save  their  common  charge — 

CIVILIZATION 


H1VM\H 


The  White  Race  is  facing  its  third  Crisis.  The  first  was  at 
the  Fall  of  Rome.  The  second  was  at  the  Reformation.  The 
third  is  now — at  the  rise  of  Science.  It  took  a  thousand  years 
to  recover  from  the  first.  The  second  was  a  remedy  for  that 
first.  For  a  hundred  years  that  remedy  has  been  failing.  Either 
a  lapse  or  a  boost  in  Civilization  is  due  soon. 


PREFACE 

To  my  neighbors,  wherever  in  this  world  of  haphazard 
advance  they  are  longing  for  greater  security  through  a 
more  balanced  progress,  this  work  of  love  is  offered.  There 
is  today  an  anxious  multitude  who  do  not  see  any  way  out 
of  the  present  unparalleled  and  increasing  mental  turmoil 
with  its  attendant  physical  sufferings.  Due  to  conditions 
which  they  hitherto  could  not  avoid,  their  point  of  view 
has  lacked  the  perspective  of  Evolution  and  History.  They 
are  fast  becoming  either  discouraged  or  indifferent.  Noble 
at  heart,  they  cherish  (they  could  hardly  tell  why)  the 
unspoken  hope  that  brighter  days  are  somehow  coming. 

To  these  I  write.  For  their  serious  attention  I  plead. 
Into  the  new  airplane  of  Scientific  Progress  I  entreat  them 
to  enter.  With  the  field-glass  of  constructive  scientific 
criticism  I  beg  them  to  survey  with  me  that  realm  which 
men  call  Christendom. 

It  is  forty  years  since  I  began  to  realize  that  the  views 
of  mankind  are  being  fundamentally  transformed,  and  it 
now  is  getting  clear  that  more  than  any  other  one  thing, 
the  majority  stand  in  need  of  that  new  understanding  which 
Modern  Science  is  today  amply  able  to  give  them.  By 
"Science"  is  meant  those  inductions  (regarding  the  world 
and  its  life)  which  have  been  sifted  and  verified.  This,  and 
nothing  less,  can  be  a  safe  basis  for  living-getting  and 
patriotic  action.  And,  yet,  in  this  age  of  jostling  views  and 
hustling  activities,  how  very  difficult  for  the  average  person 
is  that  intellectual  ascent. 

The  greatest  advances  in  civilization  have  been  made 
during  the  two  generations  just  past,  and  they  are  the  direct 
result  of  the  greater  prevalence  and  more  potent  workings 

7 


8  PREFACE 

of  the  scientific  s[)irit.  Scientific  knowledge  now  compre- 
hends such  a  body  of  well  verified  facts,  so  transforming 
in  character,  that  it  is  actually  a  new  "gospel."  A  knowledge 
of  its  first  principles  is  indispensable  for  the  "salvation"  of 
men  and  society  from  present  and  impending  ills.  It  is 
alrcatly  becoming  the  basis  of  a  new  and  profoundcr  faith 
for  the  civilized  races.  This  gospel  studies  not  one  but  all 
the  faiths  of  the  past,  while  it  excludes  none  of  the  facts  of 
the  present.  It  is  simple  enough  in  its  essential  philosophy 
to  be  grasped  by  the  child  or  the  roadside  laborer,  yet 
profound  enough  in  depth  and  scope  to  tax  the  wisest.  It 
claims  no  monopoly  of  truth,  but  only  demands  the  utter 
sincerity  of  every  mind  toward  that  which  is  highest  and 
best  to  it  (always  taking  for  granted  that  what  is  highest 
and  best  today  may  yet  be  higher  and  better  tomorrow). 
It  admits  no  absolute  perfections,  and  puts  no  limits  to  the 
scope  of  moral  ideals.  It  insists  on  duty  today,  working 
courageously  toward  the  highest  perfectibility  here  and  now 
of  every  son  and  daughter  of  the  human  family. 

It  is  here  premised  that  a  vast  transformation  of  the 
biblical  or  Hebrew  type  of  Aryan  Religion  (commonly 
called  Protestant  and  Catholic  Orthodoxy)  began  with  the 
Scientific  Movement  about  four  centuries  ago.  Under  these 
general  names  Semitic  Neo-Judaism  ("Christianity")  has 
held  all  Mediterranean  and  Nordic  Aryan  masses  until 
recently.  During  the  last  quarter  of  the  Nineteenth 
Century  there  got  under  way  what  may  be  broadly  termed 
the  doctrines  of  Evolution  and  of  Socialism,  together  with 
the  investigation  known  as  the  "Higher  Criticism"  of  the 
authoritative  books  of  the  Christian  (or  Neo-Judaic) 
Church.  These  new  Movements  took  generations  for  their 
development,  but  finally  they  have  broken  the  spell  of  the 
"Age  of  Faith"  which  had  held  the  Aryan  Occident  for  some 
fifteen  hundred  years.  (See  Chap.  XI  Sec.  "Christianity 
Exotic  to  Aryans.") 

The  signs  are  numerous  and  wide  spread.  In  continental 
Europe  hundreds  of  advanced  thinkers  have  become  radical. 
They   are   no   longer  quiet,   tolerant   and   submissive.     For 


PREFACE  9 

half  a  century  or  more  some  of  them  have  led  destructive 
scholarly  attacks  with  telling  effects.  Altogether,  the  free- 
thinking,  speculative  and  historically  critical  movement  has 
now  become  a  colossal  sociological  phenomenon.  The  like 
has  not  been  seen  in  history  since  Imperial  Roman  times. 

Of  course,  the  Great  W^orld  War  had  several  causes,  but 
the  future  historian  will  find  that  by  far  the  greatest  of 
these  was  the  breaking  down  of  the  iniling  Teutonic  char- 
acter resulting  from  the  decay  of  its  religion  without  an 
accompanying  building  up  of  a  newer,  more  up-to-date  basis 
for  a  moral  and  social  life.  It  had  its  close  parallel  with 
the  break-up  of  all  ancient  faiths  and  the  fall  of  ancient 
nations,  and  the  final  climactic  decay  of  the  old  Roman 
religion  after  the  Romans  had  gathered  in  all  the  decaying 
nations.  Then  they  themselves  went  down  for  the  same 
reason.  Christianity  came  too  late  to  save  the  political 
organization.  The  Roman  world  had  religiously  decayed 
and  was  morally  rotten  even  before  the  Christian  movement 
began. 

Today,  a  striking  parallel  is  evident  in  Central  Europe 
and  is  fast  making  its  appearance  throughout  Christendom. 
The  Germans  as  a  people  have  been  losing  their  old-time 
Christian  faith  earlier  and  more  rapidly  than  any  other 
branch  of  the  Aryan  race,  and  they  are  not  yet  replacing  it 
with  a  natural  endogenous  growth  of  theory  and  ideal  such 
as  is  beginning  to  appear  among  millions  of  individuals  in 
Anglo-Saxon  countries.  Germans  are  yet  predominantly 
speculative.  Science  is  the  mode  of  a  more  matter-of-fact 
investigative  people.  The  Anglo-Saxons  produced  the 
.Science  of  Geology  and  consequently  extended  the  time 
perspective  of  man.  The  English  Darwin  discovered  the 
biological  law  of  "Natural  Selection,"  but  fortunately 
neither  Darwin  nor  the  English  have  made  it  a  last  word 
in  philosophy  and  sociology.  The  dominant  Germans,  being 
well  on  the  road  to  the  negation  of  all  traditions  from  the 
ancient  times,  seized  upon  this  half -evolved  Evolution 
Theory  anrl  made  a  social  philosophy  of  it.  Their 
Xietzsches  and  Bernhardis  never  saw  the  higher  meaning. 


lo  PREFACE 

They  adopted  as  the  State  ideal  the  blind  forces  of  crude 
nature  and  saw  no  further  "selection"  to  be  undertaken  by 
man.  They  gave  Evolution  the  primitive,  materialistic 
interpretation — stopping  with  "Natural  Selection."  The 
English  and  American  biologists,  sociologists  and  psycholo- 
gists have  gone  on  to  Purposive,  Rational,  Moral  and  Social 
Selection.  Many  German  scholars  would  have  done  this 
too,  but  to  the  German  official  mind.  Evolution  meant 
following  the  brute  ways  of  the  wood  and  the  jungle.  To 
the  British  and  American,  Evolution  has  mostly  meant 
growth,  development,  progress  not  only  by  Natural  Selection 
in  material  things,  but  also  by  Purposive  Selection  in  all 
those  virtues  and  aspirations  which  have  been  the  growing, 
instinctive  yearnings  of  all  finer  spirits  during  the  Christian 
centuries.  And  it  has  further  meant  growth  toward  an 
unlimited  ideal  future.  The  German  Government's  misin- 
terpretation of  Evolution  has  led  to  ruthless,  self-centered. 
World-conquering  ambition  and  an  autocrat's  vanity  that 
will  for  centuries  be  a  by-word  of  shame  for  the  rest  of  the 
world.  The  Anglo-Saxon  interpretation  of  Evolution  is 
leading  to  international  co-operation  and  a  combined  effort 
to  put  an  end  to  reversionary  primitive  outbreaks  and 
furnish  a  secure  basis  for  political  and  finally  industrial 
democracy. 

The  ideal  of  an  "Age  of  Science"  has  for  a  century  been 
slowly — but  now  more  rapidly — arising  in  the  Anglo-Saxon 
lands,  and  is  being  tardily  and  grudgingly  borrowed  by  all 
the  other  races.  It  is  dividing  the  people  into  two  types  of 
believers^  traditional  minded  and  scientific  minded. 

The  decay  of  old  doctrines  is  an  evidence  of  intellectual 
growth,  but  if  the  growth  is  not  rapidly  reconstructive,  there 
always  threatens  what  Professor  Goldwin  Smith  called  a 
"moral  interregnum."  History  has  made  it  plain  that 
morality  reverts  to  primitive  impulses  when  a  traditional 
religious  foundation  is  destroyed  and  another  foundation  is 
not  supplied.  The  self-centered  instincts  are  deep  because 
so  early  evolved.  The  society-sustaining  instincts  are  new, 
late,  and  hence  less  deeply  seated.     Traditions  grow  rapidly 


PREFACE  II 

and  are  treasured  and  fostered  to  boost  the  newly  evolved 
impulses.  When  by  broader  experience  the  traditions  begin 
to  be  doubted,  then  the  vastly  older  biological,  primitive, 
self-centered  inheritance  at  once  claims  sway,  and  social 
institutions  and  all  civilization  are  endangered.  To  go  back 
and  find  safety  is  impossible.  To  go  ahead  and  find  better 
reasons  for  the  better  life  is  the  only  safety.  This  is  the 
lesson  from  all  decaying  religions  of  all  historic  people. 

Our  age  is  far  advanced  in  the  change.  We  face  the 
danger.  We  should  make  the  transit  safely.  Yesterday 
other  peoples  could  not.  We  have  a  vast  body  of  new  and 
well-verified  facts  about  the  universe.  We  are  spreading 
this  under  the  name  of  "Scientific  education."  These  facts 
and  our  new  civic  life  have  given  us  a  new  social  ideal — 
political  and  industrial  democracy.  The  only  really  great 
danger  ahead  is  in  not  getting  a  World-outlook,  a  Cos- 
mology, a  Religion  that  is  consistent  with  our  facts  of 
Science.  The  Church  has  been  furnishing  the  Ancient 
Outlook  for  "the  masses".  But  if  the  Church  continues 
to  teach  ancient  legend  in  the  face  of  the  plain  discoveries 
of  Science,  the  Church  will  either  face  defeat  and  extinction 
by  being  superseded,  or  destruction  by  going  down  in  the 
common  wreck  for  which  her  obstinacy  was  the  chief  cause. 

No  religion  ever  yet  reformed  of  itself.  Will  the  Chris- 
tian Church  prove  an  exception?  Or  will  Science  organize 
a  receivership? 

"No  nation  ever  outlived  its  religion." 

DuREN  J.  H.  Ward 
Denver,  Colorado 


CONTENTS 

Page 
Preface  .......  7 

A  Tribute  to  the  Christian  Church  ...  14 

Prologue — The  Diminishing  Church.     Why?         .  .  15 

The  Lines  of  Our  Survey  ...  25 

PART    ONE 

THE   DRAMA  OF  CHRISTIANITY 
Chapter 

I.  Epitome — The  Five  Great  Acts  .  .  29 

II.  The  Beginning  of  Protest  in  Act  III— Wiclif  .  37 

III.  The  Next  Great  Protest— Act  IV— Luther       .  53 

IV.  Protestantism — Its  Essence  and  Limitations  .  64 
V.  The    Protest    Movement — A    Northern    Race 

Awakening       .....  76 

VI.     The  Making  of  Modern  Times  by  Protest      .  82 

PART   TWO 

THE  GREATEST  TRANSITION  IN  HUMAN  HISTORY— ACT  V. 

Vn.     The  Latest  Organized  Protestant-ism              .  89 

VIII.     The  Unorganized  Protest-ants     .             .             .  100 

IX.     Resulting  Changes  in  World  Outlook     .             .  Ill 
X.     The  Old-Time  Preacher  'mid  the  New  Time 

Needs                 .....  121 
XI.     The  New-Time  Preacher  With  the  New-Time 

Facts                  .....  135 

PART  THREE 
THE   AUTHORITY   OF   FORMER   TIMES 


XII.  Beauties  of  the  Old  Bible 

XIII.  Why  Preach  About  the  Bible? 

XIV.  "Higher  Criticism  and  Its  Great  Discoveries" 
XV.  The  Old  Bible         .... 

XVI.  Inspiration,  Revelation  and  Sacredness 

12 


153 
161 
167 
176 
183 


CONTENTS 


13 


PART   FOUR 

THE   SUBSTITUTED   AUTHORITY   OF   SCIENCE 
Chapter  Page 

XVII.     The  New  Bible       .....  191 

XVIII.     The  New  Bible— Book  I— Of  The  Heavens- 
Astronomy        .....  195 
XIX.     The    New    Bible— Book    II— Of    The    Earth- 
Geology             .....             202 


PART   FIVE 
THE    "INSCRUTABLE    MYSTERIES" 


XX.  The  Problem  of  Evil 

XXI.  Moral  Sanctions  from  Brute  to  Saint 

XXII.  Prayer  and  Law  and  Common  Sense 

XXIII.  The  Old  Worship  and  The  New 

XXIV.  On  The  Divide 

XXV.  Freedom — Religion — Church 


212 
222 
232 
240 
250 
257 


XXVI. 

XXVII. 

XXVIII. 


PART  SIX 

A  HIGHER  EFFICIENCY  HAILED 

The  Ought-To-Be  Church 

Tlie  New  Ministry  Must  Develop  New  Methods 

Collegiate  Preaching — The  Way  to  Success     . 


264 
270 
280 


PART  SEVEN 

RELIGIOUS    RECONSTRUCTION   URGENT 

XXIX.     Scientific  Doctrine  and  Method  Imperative     . 
XXX.     Sample  Close-ups  of  Thought  Conditions 
XXXI.     Reticence  of  Science  Dangerous 
XXXII.     If   We   Must    Have   a    Creed— The   Creed    of 
Science  ..... 


289 
299 
306 

315 


RETROSPECT    AND    PROSPECT    of    Aryan 
Civilization 


A    TRIBUTE 

'pHE  CHRISTIAN  CHURCH  has  been  the 
greatest  and  longest  continued  organizaion 
developed  by  mankind.  It  has  included  more 
individuals,  has  covered  and  molded  more  phases 
of  their  lives,  has  developed  more  social  machin- 
ery, has  planned  more  enterprises,  has  stimulated 
more  art,  has  inspired  more  literature,  has  been 
the  fountain  of  more  heroic  efforts,  has  planned 
more  widely  for  human  good,  has  built  more 
buildings,  has  raised  more  money  for  social  pur- 
poses, has  enlisted  more  willing  service,  than  any 
other  institution  aiming  to  control  primitive 
human  desire  and  alleviate  human  need. 

And  yet  this  is  not  enough!  Past  deeds  never 
fill  present  needs.  No  living  organism,  no  social 
organism  can  continue  on  the  basis  of  what  it 
has  done.  Every  living  thing  must  live  today, 
else  it  begins  today  to  die. 


14 


PROLOGUE 
THE  DIMINISHING  CHURCH— WHY? 

There  is  spreading  through  Christendom  a  feeling  of 
alarm  concerning  the  falling  off  in  church  membership,  the 
decrease  in  church  influence,  and  the  increase  in  the  non- 
church  portion  of  the  population.  An  Episcopal  bishop  at 
a  convention  in  Philadelphia,  not  long  ago,  was  reported  as 
saying,  that  there  is  "a  definitely  anti-Christian  drift  which 
seems  to  be  increasing  in  force."  The  bishops  of  the  Four- 
Yearly  Methodist  General  Conference  at  Des  Moines  lately 
issued  a  very  important  statement  declaring:  "A  new  age  is 
here.  We  cannot  get  back  to  the  less  troubled,  more  simple, 
placid  days.  We  are  now  at  a  crisis;  if  we  fail  now,  it  will 
not  matter  what  else  we  do."  Similar  typical  statements 
of  such  sad  facts  are  heard  throughout  the  land. 

Future  pages  will  make  clear  that  this  problem  is  far 
bigger  than  the  best  meaning  church  people  imagine. 
Though  there  may  possibly  be  42,000,000  nominal  members 
in  all  the  various  church  organizations  in  this  country;  yet 
the  steadily  increasing  un-churched  population  now  numbers 
64,000,000,  in  which  recent  church  authorities  include 
20,000,000  young  people  in  the  present  rising  generation  who 
will  receive  no  religious  training!     Why? 

But  numbers  would  not  signify  so  much,  if  we  had  to  do 
with  a  new  or  growing  cause.  We  are  here  dealing  with 
only  another  bad  symptom  in  an  already  long  process  of 
decay.  Aside  from  this  drop  in  figures,  the  Church  has 
for  two  generations  been  very  inefficient  as  an  inhibitor  of 
crime,  while  it  has  steadily  fallen  down  as  a  stimulator  of 
advanced  and  higher  ideals.  Today  it  is  scarcely  twenty- 
five  percent  effective  in  the  accomplishment  of  the  things 

15 


i6  PROLOGUE 

for  vvhicli  it  has  historically  stood.  The  world  is  teeming 
with  moral  and  social  problems  before  which  the  Church 
stands  in  helpless  dismay.  It  cries  out  against  some  of  the 
so-called  evils  in  feeble,  half-confident  manner.  Others  it 
dare  not  speak  of  or  does  not  know  of.  How  different 
would  be  its  mien  if  it  had  been  keeping  close  to  Science 
and  proclaiming  its  truths  these  last  two  hundred  years ! 
The  Church  has  made  its  own  condition  of  embarrassment. 

We  are  here  facing  not  merely  a  religious  problem  of 
our  own  day,  but  we  are  up  against  one  of  those  rhythmic 
epochs  in  history.  Species,  races,  nations,  religions,  all 
have  their  day.  World  conditions  change.  All  life,  all 
institutions  must  adapt  themselves.  Fitness  is  the  only 
qualification  for  continuance.  The  fittest  survive.  It  will 
be  the  object  of  these  pages  to  try  to  portray  the  presenr 
conditions  of  Western  Civilization  as  affecting  religion  and 
its  propagating  plant,  the  Christian  Church. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  when  the  Church  was  intimately 
related  to  the  life  of  the  community,  there  were  almost  no 
people  outside  of  it.  Since  the  time  of  the  Reformation, 
near  the  beginning  of  the  i6th  century,  the  number  of  non- 
members  has  steadily  increased.  Why  is  this?  Is  it  going 
to  increase  until  the  whole  population  are  non-members? 

Those  who  do  not  belong  to  the  churches  are  of  various 
classes,  and  for  each  class  there  is  a  different  reason. 
Moreover,  some  of  the  reasons  are  from  the  side  of  the 
Church. 

The  conditions  now  are  very  different  from  either  those 
of  early  Christianity  or  those  of  the  Middle  Age  Church. 
In  the  early  years  of  the  Christian  era,  Christianity  was  a 
gospel,  a  human  cause,  a  movement  destined  by  its  fitness 
to  secure  more  and  more  adherents  and  to  eventually  become 
organized.  At  the  beginning  it  was  limited  to  Jesus,  his 
Disciples,  and  a  few  enthusiasts.  Near  the  end  of  this  first 
period  it  included  millions  in  every  part  of  the  far-reaching 
Roman  Empire. 

After  the  decay  of  Rome  and  the  inmixing  of  the 
Northern  tribes  with  the  Southern  European  peoples,  the 


PROLOGUE  17 

Church  organization  became  complete,  and  it  gradually 
propagated  its  cause  until  its  membership  became  coexten- 
sive with  the  whole  population  of  the  new  Holy  Roman 
Empire  and  with  that  of  the  lesser  nations  that  grew  out  of 
the  great  interblending.  Church  and  State  were  fused 
together.  The  rulers  became  Christian  by  profession, — 
champions  and  instruments  of  the  Church  Hierarchy. 
Indeed,  their  chief  business  came  to  be  the  maintenance  of 
the  Churchianity. 

THE  REFORMATION    AN    ENCOURAGEMENT  OF  INDIVIDUAL 

OPINION 

One  chief  meaning  of  the  great  Reformation  (1517)  was 
the  assertion  of  individuality.  This  was  the  opening  of  the 
Church  doors  outward.  Before  this  (since  the  days  of 
Constantine)  they  had  opened  only  inward.  There  had 
come  about  a  great  change  in  human  intelligence.  Ignorant 
men  can  be  coerced  and  restrained.  Not  so  men  of  know- 
ledge. These  have  choices  and  they  demand  the  right  to 
make  them.  It  was  impossible,  when  once  the  doors  were 
burst  outward,  to  keep  men  in  the  church  against  their  will. 
Gradually  intelligence  has  spread,  diversity  of  opinion  has 
increased,  and  men  have  taken  their  liberty  and  gone  whither 
they  would.  This  individuality  has  shown  itself  in  the  very 
numerous  sects  of  Protestantism.  Also  in  the  vast  un- 
churched mass. 

Let  us  now  try  to  determine  some  of  the  reasons  why 
these  60,000,000  individnals  are  not  a  part  of  some  of  the 
many  church  organizations.  These  reasons  will  give  a  sort 
of  classification  of  the  unchurched  masses. 


THE  SELFISH   BUNCH 

I.  The  bottom  reason  is  found  in  human  selfishness. 
The  selfish  impulses  are  first  in  life.  Social  impulses  which 
have  the  good  of  the  race  in  view  are  regarded  as  enemies 


i8  PROLOGUE 

to  self.  The  child  mind  and  the  ignorant  mind  never  see 
any  good  reason  for  yielding  up  their  own  will  or  desire. 

Now  many  people  become  willfully  and  habitually  fol- 
lowers of  their  narrow  selfish  impulses.  Against  all  this 
the  Church  has  always  been  more  or  less  arrayed.  But 
badness  never  likes  to  be  opposed.  The  Church's  preaching 
and  labors  are  a  disagreeable  rebuke.  People  in  this  class 
resent  rebuke,  and  they  stay  away  if  they  can.  They 
eventually  hate  the  virtues  which  the  Church  (at  its  best) 
exists  to  inculcate.  They  dislike  to  realize  that  they  are  not 
as  good  as  they  ought  to  be,  and  they  shun  association  with 
those  who  are  better,  or  who  would  become  better.  When 
Aristides,  surnamed  The  Just,  was  banished  from  Athens 
because  of  a  sharp  dispute  with  Themistocles,  the  vote  was 
publicly  taken.  An  unlettered  citizen,  a  coarse  obstinate 
fellow,  who  knew  nothing  of  Aristides  and  who  could  net 
even  write  his  vote,  asked  a  man  standing  by  to  write  it 
for  him  on  a  shell.  The  man  whom  he  asked  chanced  to 
be  Aristides  himself.  "And  what  name  shall  I  write?" 
"Aristides."  "And,  pray,  what  wrong  has  Aristides  done 
you?"  "Oh,  none;  but  I  am  tired  of  always  hearing  him 
called  The  Just." 

Similar  people  will  never  belong  to  the  Church,  if  they 
can  avoid  it.  In  an  age  of  liberty,  they  can  avoid  it.  From 
them  there  is  really  no  hope. 

THE  ICONOCLASTS 

2.  Closely  allied  to  them  is  another  class  whose  vice  is 
not  in  the  way  of  immoral  acts,  but  of  an  unrestrainable 
intellectual  egotism.  Under  the  same  conditions  as  previ- 
ously described,  liberty  has  become  license,  and  then  ignor- 
ance becomes  assuming.  Though  having  relatively  little 
preparation,  nevertheless  they  doubt  not  their  competency 
to  settle  the  greatest  problems  of  the  ages.  This  tendency 
becomes  a  habit,  and  shortly  we  have  a  human  disposition 
that  finds  its  delight  in  opposition.  It  always  strives  to  find 
reasons  to  oppose  what  the  Church  asserts.    To  such  minds, 


PROLOGUE  19 

the  Church  presently  becomes  a  hobby  for  the  expression 
of  their  hatred.  Iconoclasm  is  the  passion  of  their  Hves. 
Their  bigotry  often  becomes  keener  than  that  which  they 
would  destroy.  Their  enemies  have  no  virtues.  Some  of 
these  radicals  are  in  every  city. 

THE    SHIRKERS 

3.  There  is  another  class  who  are  not  so  bad  in  the  way 
of  positive  immorality,  and  who  have  none  of  the  unwhole- 
some intellectual  aggressiveness  of  the  radicals  just 
described ;  but  who,  though  desiring  to  be  counted  v/ith  the 
aspiring  and  the  good,  are  not  willing  to  make  the  effort 
and  sacrifice  the  means  which  are  necessary.  Many  of  them 
join  the  Church  but  shirk  its  responsibilities  at  every  safe 
point.  If  times  are  hard,  and  if  they  must  reduce  expenses, 
they  ask:  "What  shall  we  give  up?  Tea,  coffee,  tobacco, 
this  or  that  luxury?  No,  we  can't  get  along  without  these. 
Let's  see;  we  can  give  up  the  religious  newspaper.  We  can 
divide  our  subscription  by  three.  We  can  put  in  one-fourth 
as  much  in  the  collection.  Altogether  this  is  quite  a  re- 
trenchment ;  and  nobody  will  know  the  difference.  Our 
standing  will  be  just  as  good." 

Or  perhaps,  worse  than  this,  they  shirk  out  of  the  respon- 
sibility entirely.  They  stay  away  for  months  or  even  years 
at  a  time.  They  give  no  reason.  If  ever  accosted,  they  are 
"coming  soon."     They  refuse  to  see  or  say  the  real  reason. 

THE   INANE   AND  THE   SLACK 

4.  The  next  class  are  too  lacy  to  be  bad,  too  weak  to  be 
egotistic,  have  too  little  self-respect  to  care  much  about  their 
social  standing  and  too  little  idealism  and  sense  of  higher 
life  to  realize  what  their  year-in  anrl  year-out  staying  at 
home  will  deprive  them  of.  The  newspaper  and  idle  gossip 
with  others  of  their  own  class  are  their  sole  substitute.  And 
so  they,  in  a  half  unconscious  way,  lie  around  and  miss  that 
higher    improvement    of    all    their   higher    faculties    which 


20  PROLOGUE 

might  be  within  their  reach.  They  thus  remain  ciphers  in 
society,  so  far  as  the  exertion  of  any  influence  for  moral 
progress  is  concerned.  Of  this  class  there  are  doubtless 
hundreds  in  every  town.  They  live  only  in  the  physical  side 
of  their  existence.  They  perform  the  labors  that  fall  to 
tliem  in  the  struggle  for  a  living  on  the  animal  plane.  Of 
the  pro  founder  nature  of  life  they  never  get  a  glimpse.  To 
the  higher  enjoyments  that  come  from  the  contemplation 
of  great  principles,  they  are  strangers.  And  they  must 
remain  so.  When  the  majority  of  the  nation  comes  to  be  of 
their  class,  the  nation  will  fall  a  wreck  to  the  inanity,  un- 
morality  and  immorality  of  its  subjects.  Of  the  great 
things  that  have  been  done  for  them  by  the  earnest  minds 
of  former  times,  they  are  as  ignorant  as  children.  That 
great  debt  to  the  Past  which  zve  can  pay  only  to  the  Future, 
they  will  never  pay.  They  are  filled  with  the  most  hopeless 
form  of  ingratitude,  the  one  which  has  its  roots  in  ignorance 
of  what  has  been  done  for  them. 


THE  RECREATIONISTS   AND   SPORTS 

5.  There  is  another  class  of  automobile,  bicycle,  and 
baseball  sports,  movie  fans,  Sunday  picnickers,  menders  and 
tinkerers.  This  includes  a  very  large  number  of  most 
capable  and  most  estimable  people  who  through  lack  of 
system  and  earnest  thought  thereupon,  allow  many  splendid 
opportunities  in  course  of  years  to  be  lost.  Each  and  all  of 
the  things  which  they  do  (in  the  way  of  things  they  could 
not  do  in  other  days)  might  have  their  place  without  de- 
priving them  of  the  opportunity  of  attending  meetings  of 
common  human  inspiration,  if  such  meetings  were  only 
more  available.  I  speak  from  experience  regarding  this 
class.  For  them  I  have  a  tender  sympathy.  They  are  a 
class  who  would  profit  greatly  from  the  ministrations  and 
membership  of  a  sensible  unbigoted,  up-to-date  Church. 


PROLOGUE  21 


church's  doctrines  its  own  biggest  obstacle 

6.  But  the  deepest  and  most  prominent  reason,  the  one 
which  covers  the  case  for  the  most  influential  and  increas- 
ingly numerous  class,  is  entirely  the  fault  of  the  Church. 
And  it  is  by  far  the  most  serious  one.  It  is,  directly  and 
indirectly,  the  reason  for  many  of  the  others.  I  refer  to 
the  enormous  amount  of  bad  thinking  and  wornout  doctrines 
which  come  from  its  oracles.  Sentimentalism,  laziness, 
ignorance,  and  traditional  fixed  ideas  keep  the  Church  from 
occupying  the  advanced  position  which  it  ought  to.  At 
times  and  in  places  it  is  actually  striving  to  live  behind  its 
opportunities.  This  results  in  bigotry,  and  bigotry  is  blind. 
New  discoveries  are  made,  new  laws  are  opened  up,  and 
every  thinking  man  sees  that  certain  long-held  doctrines 
must  be  modified  or  set  aside. 

In  tlie  days  when  the  Transcendentalists  were  examining 
the  orthodox  articles  of  faith,  one  devoted  Presbyterian 
woman  down  east  was  much  bewildered  and  not  a  little 
provoked  to  see  the  things  which  had  been  her  sacred  trust 
slipping  away ;  but  finally  she  came  to  this  resigned  conclu- 
sion: "I  don't  care  so  much  about  predestination  and  free- 
will and  them  sort  of  things,  but  if  they  take  away  my 
total  depravity,  I  shall  feel  as  though  I  hadn't  any  religion 
at  all."  Now  one  and  now  another  doctrine  is  of  chiefest 
importance.  Prof.  Henry  Ware,  Jr.,  used  to  tell  his 
students  at  Harvard  of  a  young  minister  w^ho  one  day  told 
the  fleacon  of  his  doubts  concerning  the  existence  of  the 
Devil.  The  deacon  in  amazement  replied:  "Not  believe  in 
the  Devil !     Why,  you  are  an  atheist !" 

Every  well-informed  man  knows  many  facts  concerning 
the  results  of  the  discoveries  from  Archcoology,  History, 
Biology,  Geology,  Astronomy,  etc.  And  he  knows  that 
these  now  demonstrated  truths  must  change  the  doctrines 
concerning  the  universe  and  man,  and  the  origin  of  both. 
These  discoveries  come  up  in  the  form  of  objections  to  those 
things  which  have  been  thought  to  be  true.  The  Church 
either  ignores  them  altogether,  or  it  does  not  answer  them 


22  PROLOGUE 

by  the  method  oi  reason.  It  only  denies  Iheni  by  citing  its 
own  authorities.  But  this  is  begging  the  whole  question, 
since  these  "authorities"  are  a  part  of  the  very  thing  in 
dispute.  Who  does  not  know  that  the  conception  which 
reason  can  hold  regarding  God  must  be  fundamentally 
changed?  But  when  the  Church  does  not  make  these 
changes,  and  in  its  utterances  shows  its  ignorance  of  the 
fact  of  these  discoveries,  the  thinking  man  who  knows  this 
cannot  continue  to  go  to  Church.  Truth  is  contradicted 
and  his  intellect  is  continually  insulted.  The  threats  and 
imprecations  and  so-called  moral  sanctions  which  it  pro- 
claims are  to  him  simply  the  ravings  of  incompetency  or 
fanaticism.  Many  of  the  best  people  in  the  world  thus 
stay  at  home,  and  they  will  continue  to  stay  there  until  it 
comes  to  be  rumored  about  that  from  the  pulpit  they  can 
hear  moral  inspiration  backed  by  good  Science  and  authen- 
ticated History.  The  pulpits  must  echo  the  spirit  of  the 
present  and  not  re-echo  the  echoes  of  the  past.  In  various 
ages  the  Church  has  disgraced  itself  by  the  shameless 
blatant  assumption  of  things  which  every  man  of  intelligence 
knew  were  no  longer  even  assumably  true. 

I  dwell  upon  this  point  because  it  is  the  one  which  is 
within  the  power  of  the  Church  to  rectify.  It  is  this  point 
primarily  which  is  the  thesis  of  this  book.  For  two  cen- 
turies the  Church  has  not  commanded  the  respect  nor 
retained  the  membership  and  support  of  those  who  have 
done  the  world's  best  thinking  and  who  have  accomplished 
its  unparalleled  advancement. 

CHURCH  "a  coward  ON  SOCIAL  PROBLEMS" 

7.  But  there  is  another  class  arising  w^ho  arraign  the 
Church  for  its  lack  of  attention  to  social  problems.  This  is 
the  most  prevalent  and  most  fashionable  criticism  in  our 
age.  The  Church,  which  should  be  the  believer  par  excell- 
ence in  the  redemption  of  humanity  from  misery  here  and 
now,  has  almost  universally  accepted  that  misery  as  the 
necessary  part  of  life.     In  an  easily  accountable  but  most 


PROLOGUE  23 

unfortunate  manner,  it  has  seized  upon  the  most  vulnerable 
point  in  the  whole  teaching  of  its  Founder  and  taken  as  a 
fact  of  Divine  foreordination  the  recorded  remark:  "The 
poor  ye  have  always  with  you."  I  doubt  if  he  ever  said  it; 
but  even  if  he  did,  it  was  certainly  the  baldest  misconstruc- 
tion to  take  it  as  meaning  the  predetermined  Providential 
necessity  of  poverty  and  misery.  Nor  does  this  view  accord 
with  the  spirit  of  his  teaching.  His  was  the  life  of  love  and 
trust  and  hope.  Even  the  Bible  itself  has  much  of  that  spirit. 
Often  it  commanded  tenderness.  More  than  seven  hundred 
times  does  it  enjoin  that  servants  be  treated  with  love  and 
kindness.  More  than  one  hundred  and  fifty  times  are  the 
poor  and  needy  referred  to  tenderly  and  hopefully,  while  the 
word  "rich"  appears  only  twenty-one  times.  More  than  a 
hundred  times  are  the  widows  and  orphans  spoken  of,  and 
always  compassionately.  Six  hundred  times  do  the  ex- 
pressions "right"  and  "justice"  appear;  and  "love"  and 
"mercy"  occur  three  hundred  times. 

But  why  must  the  Church  lean  on  tradition  always  and 
ever,  good  or  bad? 

CHURCH    SHOULD  LEAD   IN    SOCIALIZATION  ;   BUT  DOESN't 

No;  a  large  part  of  the  miseries  of  life  are  the  fault  of 
human  ignorance  and  human  selfishness ;  and  the  Church 
ought  to  be  the  most  hopeful  and  the  most  earnest  of  all 
bodies  in  teaching  and  working  toward  their  dispersion.  It 
ought  to  be  the  leader  in  social  improvement ;  but  instead  of 
this,  although  it  has  been  the  greatest  organization  upon  the 
globe  and  has  been  for  centuries  in  this  lead,  it  has  allowed 
the  world  to  lapse  into  or  it  has  failed  to  redeem  it  from  an 
immoral  and  unmoral  condition  which  threatens  social  ruin. 
//  ought  to  have  cured  the  Roman  Empire  and  saved  it 
from  its  fall.  But  no;  it  gradually  joined  in  the  sins  of  the 
times,  and  it  well  nigh  went  down  in  the  general  crash.  It 
was  appropriated  by  the  greed-mongers  and  became  the  chief 
instrument  of  support  for  that  feature  of  life  of  which  it 
should  have  been  the  chief  opponent. 


24  PROLOGUE 

OMINOUS    SOCIAL    CONDITIONS    AGAIN    IN    SIGHT 

Another  and  similar  time  is  upon  us.  The  world  is  fast 
dividing  into  social  classes.  The  Great  War  has  further 
paved  the  way  for  this.  It  concentrated  attention  on  condi- 
tions within  nations.  The  classes  are  becoming  more  inimical 
toward  each  other.  I  need  only  hint  the  deplorable,  threat- 
ening situation  which  confronts  society  in  all  parts  of 
Christendom  and  Commercialdom.  And  it  will  take  but 
small  powers  of  logic  to  discover  that,  in  large  degree,  it 
has  come  about  through  lack  of  duty  on  the  part  of  that 
organization  which  sets  itself  the  task  of  redeeming  the 
world,  but  doesn't  do  it.  Yielding  to  that  human  frailty 
which  was  its  first  business  to  conquer,  it  has  in  ten  thousand 
instances  sold  itself  to  the  enemy. 

And  there  are  now  in  the  world  not  a  few  true  men  and 
women  who  have  the  insight  to  see  this.  It  is  little  wonder 
that  they  find  no  comfort  in  Church-going.  This  was  the 
sort  of  Church  Jesus  found.  Against  it  his  great  intense 
soul  revolted.  But  he  did  not  desert  it,  as  those  men  of  our 
day  (to  whom  I  have  referred)  have  deserted  the  Church 
of  their  time. 


These  are  some  of  the  reasons  why  some  people  do  not 
care  for  the  Church.  There  are  still  other  reasons.  I  trust 
I  have  suggested  the  most  important  ones.  Some  of  them 
must  be  rectified  by  the  Church  itself.  Their  existence  is 
a  great  mortification  to  the  few  who  realize  them.  To 
change  this  condition  of  things  should  be  the  joyous,  earnest 
purpose  of  every  one  who  regards  the  Church  as  a  natural 
sociological  factor. 

In  association  for  good  there  is  strength  and  safety.  The 
combination  of  the  social  impulses  of  the  many  can  alone 
stem  the  selfish  impulses  of  each.  Aside  from  this,  the 
Church  has  no  excuse  for  continuance.  Than  this,  there 
neither  is  nor  could  be  any  higher,  grander,  nobler  labor. 


PROLOGUE  25 


THE  LINES  OF  OUR  SURVEY 

If  another  crisis  in  human  career  is  imminent,  it  will  be 
by  far  the  greatest  yet  encountered  by  mankind.  A  troubled 
minority  are  fretting  before  it ;  the  thoughtless  majority 
are  tragically  oblivious  of  it.  Our  world  is  a  thousand  times 
more  complicated  than  at  any  ancient  stage.  The 
Babylonians,  Egyptians,  Greeks,  Romans,  reached  a  rela- 
tively simple  eminence  and  failed, — shockingly,  piteously, 
needlessly.     They  were  all  wrecked  on  the  same  rock. 

Political  units  (nations)  flourish  only  so  long  as  their 
patriotic  enthusiasm  is  grounded  on  some  progressive  social 
ideal.  The  masses  never,  and  the  leaders  rarely,  have  been 
able  to  see  this  clearly.  On  its  larger  affairs  and  interests, 
humanity  to-date  has  proven  itself  near-sighted.  He  who 
could  make  mankind  far-sighted  enough  to  consider  its 
career  in  evolution  would  be  its  greatest  benefactor.  If  a 
considerable  number  could  now  survey  a  nearby  bit  of  time 
— just  a  few  centuries,  it  might  save  another  collapse  of 
civilization. 

In  Part  I,  through  six  chapters,  let  us  first  glimpse  "The 
Whole  Drama  of  Christianity"  and  then  see  how  it  began 
to  change  its  character  in  the  later  acts ;  how  the  deep-seated 
traditional  notions  and  authority  came  to  be  protested  under 
the  leadership  of  Wiclif  and  Luther;  Vv'hat  was  the  essence 
of  the  protest ;  how  the  protest  grew  to  be  a  great  movement 
in  history;  and  finally  a  northern  race  awakening,  a  setting 
out  upon  a  really  new  career  for  mankind — Modern  Times, 
to  be  sharply  distinguished  from  all  former  times. 

In  Part  II,  we  shall  try  to  grasp  the  present  condition  of 
the  movement  of  protest,  and  we  shall  see  in  it  "The 
Greatest  Transition  in  Human  History".  Protestantism 
organized  is  giving  way  to  Protest-ants  unorganized,  and 


26  PROLOGUE 

the  World's  way  of  looking  at  the  World  is  amazingly  and 
profoundly  changing.  "The  Old-Time  Preacher  'mid  the 
New-Time  Needs"  is  a  sorry  misfit,  and  "The  New-Time 
Preacher  with  the  New-Time  Facts"  is  hardly  yet  on  Ihc 
job.  Hence,  a  dangerous  chaos  in  world  doctrine  and  social 
practice. 

In  Part  III,  it  will  be  necessary  to  re-examine  "The 
Authority  of  Former  Times"  in  order  later  to  contrast  it 
with  the  now  on-coming  authority  of  these  and  future  times. 
The  description  of  "The  Beauties  of  the  Old  Bible"  is  the 
most  agreeable  of  all  our  duties,  but  the  story  of  "The 
Higher  Criticism,"  the  careful,  honest  judgment  of  what  we 
had  over-looked  and  the  awful  flaws  and  frauds  revealed, 
are  regrettable  but  necessary  tasks. 

hi  Part  IV  "The  Substituted  Authority  of  our  Modern 
Science"  is  a  conception  hard  to  grasp.  The  transition 
from  the  domination  of  a  Book  whose  adherents  for  ages 
have  forbidden  all  questions  about  it,  to  a  new  series  of 
books  scarcely  dry  from  the  press,  is  a  psychological  feat 
full  of  peril  to  faith.  And  yet  whoso  essays  the  task 
succeeds  to  a  ten-fold  greater  enthusiasm.  The  "New 
Bible"  is  "revelation"  replete  with  truth  to  date.  The 
contrast  with  Semitic  mythology  about  the  creation  of  the 
Heavens  and  the  Earth  will  be  shown  in  chapters  outlining 
Books  I  and  H  of  the  New  Bible.  These  epitomize  the 
greater  facts  revealed  through  Astronomy  and  Geology. 
They  are  but  simple  samples  of  that  noble  enlargement 
which  will  follow  in  the  guidance  of  life  when  Science  shall 
treat  every  field. 

In  Part  V ,  some  of  the  so-called  "Inscrutable  Mysteries" 
(v/hich  have  been  a  millstone  on  the  neck  of  progress)  are 
solved  by  the  sciences  of  Biology  and  Psychology.  Com- 
bining a  false  Theology  and  a  short-sighted  Ethics,  the 
Semites  over-burdened  life  with  the  doctrine  of  "The  Fall 
of  Man",  and  thereby  damned  all  the  Aryan  borrowers  of 
their  religion  to  regard  the  world  as  a  hopeless  "Vale  of 
Tears"  during  these  3000  years.  Around  a  fateful  doctrine 
of  unescapable  Heredity  they  twined  all  history  and  built 


\ 


PROLOGUE  27 

up  the  most  absurd  system  of  implacable  theology  and  blood 
atonement  which  the  barbarisms  of  man  have  ever  invented. 
"The  Problem  of  Evil"  bore  men  down  till  they  came  to 
regard  this  life  as  having  no  consequence  save  as  a  prepara- 
tion for  another,  into  which  none  could  enter  by  self- 
achieved  merit,  but  only  by  belief  in  the  inscrutable  plans 
of  an  arbitrary  deity.  Intellectual  action  was  damning. 
Hell  glared  and  Heaven  smiled  as  a  reward  for  credulity. 
The  affairs  of  this  life  were  neglected,  progress  ceased  and 
Dark  Ages  followed,  as  inevitable  consequence.  Elaborate 
systems  of  punishment  and  reward  were  devised  to  drive 
and  bribe  men  to  acquiesce  in  ancient  belief.  They  were 
taught  to  pray  and  petition  a  wrathful  tyrant  for  a  mercy 
they  could  not  understand  and  for  blessings  the  desert  for 
which  came  by  the  virtues  of  another.  Today,  when  we 
study  the  central  idea  of  all  the  historic  religions,  the  awe- 
inspiring  problem  of  worship  resolves  itself  easily  into  the 
simplicity  of  noble  earnestness;  and  the  modern  man,  full 
of  the  facts  of  Modern  Science,  though  he  holds  to  no  tenet 
of  ancient  dogma  and  performs  no  act  of  ancient  abasement, 
yet  leads  a  ten- fold  more  religious  life  and  worships  Deity 
while  he  searches  for  truth  and  goodness  and  beauty. 

In  Part  VI,  we  shall  try  to  deduce  the  "Higher  Efficiency" 
that  will  have  to  be  inaugurated  in  order  to  accomplish  the 
transition  from  Tradition  to  Science.  The  Old-Time 
Ministry,  saturated  with  its  out-aged  doctrines  and  practices, 
will  have  to  be  gradually  replaced  by  truer  ideas  and  better 
methods.  It  has  served  its  day,  and  is  no  longer  running 
the  plant  with  profit.  It  must  pass  into  a  receivership  before 
the  corporation  is  bankrupted  in  barbarism,  before  Time 
disposes  of  the  remaining  assets  at  the  "Sheriff's  Sale"  into 
ignorant  "Dark  Ages".  Only  through  the  device  of  "Col- 
legiate Preaching"  can  the  .stockholders  (humanity) 
realize  any  considerable  salvage  from  the  investment. 

In  Part  VII,  follows  the  logical  and  urgent  appeal  for 
"Reconstruction  by  Science" — the  only  source  of  hope  for 
help.  "The  sample  Close-Ups  of  Thought  Conditions" 
should  be  enough  to  produce  a  panic  for  re-organization. 


28  PROLOGUE 

Conferences  of  those  who  have  investigated  various  phases 
of  the  World  should  meet  and  name  committees  to  tell  man- 
kind, in  simple  language,  the  real  facts  and  laws  of  life  and 
being,  as  rapidly  and  as  thoroughly  as  the  great  work  can 
proceed.  \\  e  expect  to  make  clear  the  direful  and  pressing 
need  that  men  of  Scince  should  become  practical,  that  they 
should  push  forward  the  application  of  the  truths  they  dis- 
cover, that  they  should  realize  the  peril  to  society,  nation 
and  world  that  lurks  where  vast  bodies  of  natural  facts  and 
laws  are  uncovered  and  remain  unapplied  to  life.  Scientists 
must  soon  see  that  it  was  this  very  neglect  by  Greek  and 
Roman  thinkers  (after  their  great  discoveries  and  criticisms 
had  undermined  the  popular  religion  and  customs)  that 
brought  their  nations  to  dust  and  left  them  only  a  memory 
— of  glory  and  warning.  To  the  Christian  worker  who  sees, 
clearly  or  dimly,  our  place  in  history,  our  stage  of  both 
development  and  decay,  I  address  this  appeal — too  heart- 
breaking to  be  plainly  worded — as  he  cares  for  his  race,  as 
he  reveres  his  God,  as  he  loves  mankind,  as  he  hopes  for 
his  posterity  in  the  years  to  come — I  plead  that  he  heed 
the  truths  and  forgive  the  faults  of  this  book. 


I 


PART  ONE 
THE    DRAMA    OF    CHRISTIANITY 


CHAPTER  I 
EPITOME— THE  FIVE  GREAT  ACTS 

All  Creation  may  be  thought  of  as  a  drama  with  the 
Divine  Ether-Energy  as  playwright.  From  Nebulae  to 
Solar  System — How  many  acts  ?  From  Fire-mist  to  Green- 
Clad  Orb — What  variety  of  performers  ! 

So  Life,  on  this  one  small  star — from  Moneron  to  Man — 
is  but  a  lesser  play. 

And  each  special  religion,  even  Christianity — from  Jesus 
to  Emerson — is  a  drama  of  prime  interest,  to  the  players 
at  least. 

This  latter  zvorld  reVujion  has  now  played  through  four 
acts.  Through  these  it  has  been  a  "play",  more  than  a  life. 
Its  fifth  is  now  on  the  stage.  (Parenthetically  and  more 
accurately,  I  must  remark  that  this  fifth  act  is  not  a  figure  of 
speech.  A  "drama"  is  an  attempted  imitation  of  some 
reality — not  the  reality  itself.  Christianity  through  these 
four  acts  has  been  mostly  a  drama.  Its  theories — in  any  of 
their  transformations — were  never  facts.  Through  the  first 
four  acts,  these  theories  were  the  now  discredited  philosophy 
of  ancient  tradition.) 

29 


30      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

ACT   I.       JESU-ANITY 

From  A.  D.  30  to  325 

During  the  first  period  its  essence  was  simple  JESU- 
ANITY*  the  imitation  of  a  life.  As  represented  in  Jesus, 
it  was  an  original,  more  or  less  rational  independent  life; 
a  reaction  against  corruption,  degradation,  formality,  cant, 
hypocrisy,  effete  civilization.  In  the  Disciples  it  was  simply 
an  admiration,  a  reverence,  a  devotion,  a  deference  to  a 
higher  personality.  It  was  submission  to  a  superior 
character.  In  them,  it  was  an  enthusiasm  of  appreciation 
of  virtues  and  truth  concrete  in  another.  Their  under- 
standing was  too  low  to  see  these  elsewhere.  To  them  Jesus 
stood  alone  in  certain  excellencies.  Hence,  men  became  His 
"disciples". 

Discipleship  is  dependence,  the  admission  of  individual 
weakness.  To  the  disciple,  the  object  of  his  devotion  is  a 
joy.  He  sings  his  praise.  This  is  true  of  all  discipleship. 
The  case  of  Jesus  is  the  one  par  excellence.  Here  the 
exaggeration  has  transcended  all  superlatives.  In  some 
recent  instances  of  "Gospel  Hymns"  it  has  reached  its 
extremest  arresting  perversions : 

"Oh,  to  be  nothing,  nothing, 
Only  to  lie  at  his  feet, 
A  broken  and  emptied  vessel, 
For  the  Master's  use  made  meet." 

"Rather  be  nothing,  nothing, 
To  Him  let  their  voices  be  raised. 
He  is  the  founiain  of  blessing. 
He  only  is  meet  to  be  praised." 

Men  in  such  moods  quote  from  their  masters — quote  all 
they  can.  It  is  all  "good  news",  all  "gospel".  They  never 
discriminate  or  question. 

Naturally  then,  the  early  Christianity  was  Jesu-anity  i.  e., 
it  was  "evangelical", — good-news-ical.     (In  so  far  as  it  has 

*  For  the  sake  of  contrast  and  precision  I  have  invented  half 
a  dozen  words  to  express  the  stages  of  evolution  in  the  Christian 
Religion. 


EPITOME— THE  FIVE  GREAT  ACTS  31 

returned  to  the  "evangelical"  type  today,  Christianity  is 
again  a  state  of  dependence,  a  belittling  submission  to  a 
traditional  personality.  It  is  a  condition  of  arrested  de- 
velopment.) 

This  first  act  played  on  enthusiastically  for  over  two 
centuries  as  evangelical  Jesu-anity.  Its  participants  in- 
creased. The  Roman  Empire  was  gradually  going  down. 
The  world  was  decreasing  in  knowledge  and  losing  indepen- 
dence. Personality  was  going  out.  Independent  thought 
was  dying  away.  The  new  religion  came  too  late  and  was 
not  vigorous  enough  to  stem  the  ebbing  tide  of  decay.  It 
v.as  savagely  persecuted.  But  "the  whip  and  the  rack,  the 
tigers,  the  hooks  of  steel,  and  the  red  hot  beds"  were  unable 
to  crush  it.  It  had  been  launched  amid  peculiar  economic 
and  political  conditions.  It  was  the  only  morality  left  in 
the  Roman  World,  but  it  had  little  strength  of  originality. 
It  was  merely  traditional,  and  the  fact  that  it  had  a  future 
at  all  was  due  to  the  decaying  environment.  In  311  A.  D., 
the  dying  Galerius  passed  an  edict  of  toleration. 

This  struggle  and  success  (such  as  it  was)  transformed 
it.  Jesu-anity  became  Jesu-olatry,  because  persecution  only 
made  the  founder  the  dearer,  and  hence  exaggeration  the 
greater.     Act  I  was  over. 

ACT    II.       CHRIST-IANITY 

From  A.  D.  325  to  600 

Its  second  meaning  was  a  Dogma.  //  passed  from  Jesu- 
anity  to  Christ-ianity,  or  as  we  have  phrased  it  (losing  the 
etymological  significance)  to  Christianity;  from  imitation  of 
life  to  belief  about  a  life,  from  enthusiasm  for  conduct  to 
bigotry  for  creed,  from  Discipleship  to  Dogmatism. 

The  Council  of  Nicea  (325  A.  D.)  finished  the  doctrine 
toward  which  enthusiasm  tended.  Devotion  had  finally 
reached  formulation,  definite  statement.  Constantine,  the 
Emperor,  became  a  professed  disciple.  Imperial  disciple- 
.ship  meant  authority.  The  formulated  enthusiasm,  the 
"good  news"  philosophized  upon,  became,  under  Imperial 


32      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

adupliidi,  a  state-sanctioned  religion.  Here  was  a  further 
developing  power,  and  in  a  short  time  Christ-ianity  went  to 
the  extreme  of  Christ-iolatry. 

A  little  more  ignorance  in  the  people,  a  little  more  decay 
in  the  state,  a  little  weaker  hand  at  the  political  helm,  and 
Act  III  will  begin. 

The  Empire  of  Rome  went  out.  Its  last  days  were  a 
slow  death.  The  taking  over  by  the  Teutons  in  476  was 
scarcely  a  formality.  The  little  Romulus  Augustulus  was 
pensioned  oflF,  and  Odoacer,  the  Herulian  from  the  North, 
mounted  the  saddle  of  authority.  Roman  politics,  as  such, 
vanished. 

ACT  III.       CHURCH-IANITY 

From  A.  D.  600  to  1517 

Church-ianity  eclipsed  Christ-ianity  and  even  Christ- 
iolatry.  Through  geographical  position  and  political  assist- 
ance, the  Bishop  of  Rome  had  gradually  obtained  the 
dominant  influence.  Others  came  to  look  up  to  him.  The 
"papa"  at  Rome  became  the  papa.  By  600  the  papacy  was 
a  fact.  The  centralization  which  was  in  Roman  Emperor 
passed  spiritually  to  Roman  Pontiff.  Doctrine  ceased  to  be 
of  paramount  importance.  The  emphasis  was  laid  on 
orgaiiicaiion.  Numbers,  control,  complete  sway,  became  the 
aim.  Individuality  had  no  attraction.  Each  was  lost  in  all. 
The  Pope  himself  became  only  an  instrument.  The  indi- 
vidual ceased  to  be.  The  Church  came  to  be.  And  the 
more  and  more  it  came,  the  more  and  more  freedom  went. 

Enthusiasm  for  organized  ecclesia  had  augmented  and 
nearly  replaced  devotion  to  a  person  and  likewise  belief  in 
a  dogma.  For  centuries  it  rose.  By  the  time  of  Gregory 
VII  (1073-85),  it  over-rode  every  opposition.  A  hundred 
years  later,  under  Innocent  (!)  Ill,  (1203-15)  all  kings 
ruled  or  fell  by  papal  will.  The  Roman  Papa  became 
World  Papa.  The  Roman  Empire  had  become  "Holy 
Roman  Empire",  with  the  "Vicegerent  of  God"  at  the  head. 
Thereafter  kings  vied  with  each  other  in  devotion  to  reli- 


EPITOME— THE  FIVE  GREAT  ACTS  33 

gious  organization  and  centralization.  Churchly  zeal  grew 
to  be  mania.  Beggars  and  crowned  heads  swarmed  to  do  it 
service.  Fanatical  and  frenzied  mobs  set  off  in  Crusades 
against  imagined  churchly  enemies.  Church-ianity  reached 
the  stage  of  Church-iolatry.  Popular  gansciousness  was 
servile  to  ecclesiasticism.  The  Papacy  meddled  in  every- 
thing. It  controlled  birth  and  life  and  death.  Only  one 
in  a  million  knew  any  other  devotion  or  thought  of  any 
other  end.  Philip  Augustus,  who  died  in  1223,  said :  "Happy 
Saladdin,  who  has  no  pope." 

But  even  "God's  Vicegerent"  can  overreach.  In  American 
piuase  "the  Papacy  paid."  Too  many  wanted  it.  The 
Great  Schism  occurred.  From  1378  to  1417  there  were  two 
and  sometimes  three  of  "God's  Chief  Pontiffs"  cursing  and 
telling  the  truth  about  each  other,  while  they  were  burning 
Hus,  Jerome,  and  others  who  told  the  truth  about  them  all. 

During  long,  dreary  centuries  their  underlings  had  grown 
more  ignorant  and  morally  stupid.  At  last  the  sensualit}' 
of  the  religious  aristocracy  got  careless  and  forgot  to  be 
clandestine.  It  invented  the  open  sale  (jf  "indulgences"  to 
help  bear  its  iniquitous  expenses.  This  was  one  too  much. 
Act  ni  met  its  end.  Lulher  nailed  his  protest  on  the  very 
d(jors  (jf  the  r"hurch. 

ACT  IV.       BIRI.-IANTTY 

From  A.  D.  1517  to  1830 

Act  IV  was  suddenly  ushered  in.  llie  "Re-fotiu-ation" 
broke  out.  The  more  honest  "Protested."  They  appealed 
from  authority  of  ruling  Church  to  ancient  Source;  from 
Papal  College  to  Ayjostles'  Records;  from  Council  Decrees 
to  Early  .Scriptures;  froDi  Church-ianity  to  Bible.  Ecclesi- 
asticism faced  Frotesta7itism.  Church-ianity  (for  Multi- 
tudes) became  Bibl-ianity.  And  the  mood  that  was  Church- 
iolatry  soon  developed  into  Bibl-iolatry.  It  renounced 
justification  by  ceremony,  penance,  and  purchase,  and  it 
assumed  justification  by  faith  on  authority  of  "The  Book 
of  Books." 


34      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

//  zvas  a  "Re-form-ation,"  a  reverting  to  first  authority. 
It  was  also  a  re-form  in  ethics.  It  contained  the  seed  that 
should  by  and  by  drive  itself  off  the  stage.  Jt  zvas  the  germ 
of  the  conception  of  freedom.  The  protest  of  a  Luther 
would  grow  eventually  to  the  protest  of  a  world. 

But  this  protest  had  unsought  help.  The  Protest-ants  had 
no  new  thought.  They  simply  reverted  to  a  not-so-bad, 
old-time  view.  They  knew  no  more  about  God,  the  World, 
or  Man.  They  continued  in  the  general  adoption  of  the 
Ancient  World-outlook. 

The  World  was  getting  astir.  The  hold  of  the  Church 
had  become  loosened.  Attention  to  luxuries  and  sensual 
indulgence  had  made  inattention  to  control. 

Printing  had  been  invented  and  had  already  spread  too 
much  information. 

Gunpowder,  a  dust  of  an  impious  origin,  had  already  been 
turned  against  many  a  churchl}*  champion. 

And  even  the  Church  Geography  was  being  questioned. 
Against  church  wisdom  and  because  of  church  impotence 
to  forbid,  Columbus  sailed  to  find  the  setting  sun.  A  few 
years  later  Magellan's  command  completed  Columbus' 
voyage,  sailing  westward  and  returning  from  the  east ;  and 
thus  threw  undying  reproach  on  the  sacred  ignorance  which 
had  been  held  and  proclaimed  with  such  holy  assumption. 
One  awakening  begot  another.  Protests  came  thick  and 
fast. 

Discovery  and  invention  fairly  swarmed.  They  came 
from  every  field.  Knowledge  grew  so  fast  that  new 
arrangements  and  systems  were  necessary.  Classification 
began.     The  "Age  of  Science"  was  on. 

ACT  V.       SCIENCE 

From  A.  D.  1830— 

A  new  and  altogether  different  act  had  been  called. 
Tradition  was  sharply  questioned,  not  credulously  received. 
All  the  old  books  began  to  be  studied,  not  merely  learned  or 


EPITOME— THE  FIVE  GREAT  ACTS  35 

committed.  The  Classics  were  rediscovered.  ArchcEology 
(for  the  purpose  of  criticism)  became  an  intense  interest. 
Inquiry,  observation,  test,  verification  became  the  rule. 
Protesting  begun  by  one  man,  Luther,  became  common 
custom.  The  mild  protest  beginning  in  the  appeal  from  one 
authority  to  another  is  resulting  in  freedom  from  all 
authority.  Bibl-iolatry  is  getting  supplanted  by  Rationality. 
Protestant-ism  is  rapidly  becoming  Science-ism.  And  as  a 
result,  all  the  surviving  crude  duahsms,  materialisms,  and 
anthropomorphisms  brought  down  by  the  firm  hand  of  the 
Church  are  making  way  for  the  monistic,  Ether-Spirit 
conception  being  furnished  by  the  scientific  mood. 

Discipleship,  Dogmatism,  Ecclesiasticism,  Bibliolatry  are 
passing  off  the  stage.  The  individual's  use  of  his  own 
powers  (which  even  in  the  person  of  Jesus  had  so  amazed 
his  hearers  as  to  make  them  fawning  disciples)  has,  after  all 
these  long  centuries,  become  an  attitude  of  thousands  of 
minds.  By  this  germ  of  independent  rationality,  Jesus 
caught  glimpses  of  a  loftier  God  and  Duty.  By  it  (in  co- 
operation with  remarkable  and  unusually  favoring  political 
and  economic  circumstances)  he  became  the  central  figure 
of  the  traditional  period  of  human  history.  By  lack  of  it, 
men  became  his  disciples  instead  of  his  successors.  By 
lack  of  it,  men  still  remain  his  disciples — stranded,  thwarted, 
dwarfed,  in  conditions  of  arrested  mental  and  moral 
development. 

On  the  other  hand,  what  a  pageant  of  real,  independent, 
Jesuistic  successors  (not  followers)  are  taking  part  in  this 
great  Fifth  Act  of  the  religious  movement  inaugurated  by 
him!  He  led  the  way,  and  these  men  who  are  doing  their 
own  thinking  are  the  chiefest  of  his  honors.  Living  in  an 
age  of  greater  knowledge  than  his,  they  are  not  dazed  by 
his  personality — great  for  that  age.  His  life  to  them  is 
inspiration  and  encouragement ;  no  longer  authority  and 
sufjerhumanity. 

Thus  living,  thus  using  their  own  powers,  they  discover, 
for  themselves  and  others,  the  true,  the  right,  the  divine  in 
ever  greater  measure.     They  put  fact  to  fact  and  finrl  law 


36      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

and  principle.  They  have  created  for  man  a  new  heaven 
and  a  new  earth.  All  doctrine  and  opinion  they  have  trans- 
formed. Virtue  and  heaven,  sin  and  hell,  have  changed 
location  and  character.  Not  Geo-centric  but  Psycho-centric 
is  now  the  spiritual  geography.  Even  "God"  vanishes  as 
an  avenging  old  Hebrew  king,  and  in  the  clearer  liyht  we 
see  the  Immanent  Life-Universal. 

No  labels — "sacred,"  "holy,"  or  what  not — can  re-estab- 
lish traditional  authority.  No  zeal  based  upon  it  can  again 
turn  the  world  to  Discipleship,  Dogma,  Ecclesiasticism,  or 
Book- worship.  What  was  drama  in  the  first  four  acts  is 
becoming  real  life  in  the  fifth.  Much  actual  truth  about 
tlie  Cosmos  has  been  discovered,  and  men  are  rapidly  com- 
mitting themselves  to  the  New  Method. 

"Scientific"  is  the  name  they  apply  to  it.  It  is  is  largely 
an  attitude  or  disposition  toward  life  and  being.  //  is  just 
being  honest  with  things  and  facts  and  laws.  It  is  putting 
intelligent  character  into  word  and  deed.  It  is  the  settintj 
aside  of  inherited  prejudice  in  order  to  be  square  with  the 
facts. 

The  Drama  has  grown  a  thousand  times  more  interesting 
since  the  curtain  rose  on  Act  V.  Mind  has  broken  the  ropes 
of  authority.  It  has  enlarged  the  circle  of  its  traditional 
tether.  This  is  the  greatest  thing  ever  accomplished  by 
human  spirit.  It  sees  that  each  new  circle  drawn  round  the 
circle  of  former  efforts  can  still  be  enlarged  by  another 
concentric  to  it.  It  sees  that  the  areas  and  scopes  of  know- 
ledge are  squared  and  cubed  and  infinitely  multiplied  witli 
each  removal  from  the  center  of  former  authority.  Ei'ery- 
where  it  is  now  conceded  that  every  noontide  splendor  of 
achievemoit  is  only  another  daivn  to  those  zvho  shall  live 
beyond  the  horizon  of  our  present  view. 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III 

JOHN    WICLIF — I324-I384 

To  understand  the  present  is  to  know  something  of  its 
(irigin.  Modern  times  grew  out  of  former  times.  Christ- 
ianity has  been  a  much  muddled,  yet  a  natural  product  of 
human  affairs.  Its  first  fifteen  hundred  years  are  relatively 
ensy  to  comprehend.  These  were  a  long  subservient  mood 
with  no  deep  or  essential  variations. 

How  did  variation  arise?  How  came  fundamental 
revolutionary  dissent?  Progress  is  generally  more  puzzling 
than  stagnation.  Variation  toward  the  better  and  higher 
has  proved  more  difficult  to  account  for  than  retrogression 
toward  the  primitive.  To  realize  hov/  these  wondrous, 
startling,  modern  times  came  about,  it  will  be  necessary  to 
urvey  two  pivotal  lives  and  some  events  leading  to  the 
];eri<)d  of  transition  from  Middle  Age  to  Modern  History. 
More  than  any  others,  Wiclif  and  Luther  prepared  the  way 
ior  the  "Age  of  Science,"  though  neither  of  them  were 
modern  minds  nor  did  anything  directly  in  the  movement 
of  Science.* 

THE  hero's   standing 

The  world  is  often  dull  and  dilatory  in  its  recognition  of 
true  greatness.  Many  a  hero  has  to  die  without  a  word  of 
thanks   from  the  race  for  whose  good  he  has  risked  and 

•  In  finothr-r  work  nrarinp:  rnrnplrl  inn,  I  ;ini  doiilinc:  with  llio 
IfH(lor»  wtio  liavo  rhanRod  our  views  of  the  Ccsmos  (r.andiaarks 
in  Science  from  CoiunibuH  to  Spencer). 

0/ 


38      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

sacrificed  all.  Yet  later  generations,  for  whom  the  fruitago 
of  his  labors  falls  more  abundantly,  rise  up  and  call  him 
blessed.  Sooner  or  later  humanity  remembers  its  greater 
{benefactors.  Dear  to  its  memory  then  are  their  names. 
Though  the  mead  of  praise  be  tardy,  it  is  better  late  than 
never.  So  John  IViclif  stands  in  higher  esteem  than  ever 
before  at  the  distance  of  over  five  hundred  years  from  his 
death. 

That  one  is  in  advance  of  his  age,  is  what  we  mean  by  a 
reformer.  IIow  then  can  his  own  time  fully  appreciate 
him?  To  be  as  they,  were  to  be  no  hero.  He  who  would 
urge  great  reforms  must  look  to  future  ages  for  sympathy. 
The  unsympathetic  times  compelled  Wiclif  to  wait  for  a 
biographer  well-nigh  two  hundred  years.  The  greater  the 
benefactor,  and  the  more  he  has  to  recommend,  the  more 
sparingly  often  will  his  own  age  deal  out  an  appreciative 
recognition.  Though  the  "New  Learning"  was  already 
interesting  many  minds,  yet  the  world  in  Wiclif 's  day  was 
conservative  in  the  extreme.  Every  appeal  was  made  and 
every  homage  paid  to  the  venerable  past. 

THE   ENGLAND   OF    THE   FOURTEENTH    CENTURY 

By  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century  the  moral  and 
intellectual  blackness  of  the  "Dark  Ages"  had  been  changed 
to  twilight  by  the  universities,  or  high  schools,  founded  two 
centuries  before.  The  English  nation,  on  account  of  for- 
tunate advantages,  was  in  the  van  of  this  unconscious  move- 
ment which  was  dissipating  the  gloomy  mist  of  ignorance 
and  superstition,  blown  over  the  Roman  world  with  the 
flood  of  Teutonic  barbarism.  The  natural  outgrowth  of 
this  increase  of  intelligence  was  that  demand  for  liberty  and 
privilege  which  partially  secured  its  objects  by  wrenching 
from  King  John  the  Magna  Charta,  the  bulwark  of  English 
constitutional  liberty  (121 5).  Then  ensued  a  struggle  be- 
tween royalty  and  the  commons  under  Henry  III  (1216- 
1272),  lulled  for  a  time  during  the  reign  of  Edward  I,  more 
fiercely  renewed  under  Edward  II,  and  resulting  finally  in  a 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III     39 

triumph  for  the  commons  and  in  the  dethronement  and 
horrible  death  of  the  King.  Edward  III  (1327-1377),  in 
his  long  and  uninterrupted  warfare  with  the  Scots  and 
French,  yet  found  time  to  resist  the  never  ending  claims 
made  by  the  Papacy.  In  this  he  was  supported  by  parlia- 
mentary "statutes  declaring  the  independence  of  the  English 
clergy."  Within  the  Church  itself,  on  the  other  hand,  this 
was  a  period  of  the  greatest  dissention.  Such  political  and 
religious  turmoil  necessarily  begot  and  fostered,  at  least  in 
the  more  intelligent  minds,  a  spirit  of  free  inquiry  into  the 
civil  and  ecclesiastical  rights  of  men. 

BIRTH    OF   WICLIF 

Into  such  a  national  condition  as  this  came  John  Wiclif, 
"The  Morning  Star  of  the  Reformation,"  the  eminent 
scholar,  diplomatist,  and  preacher. 

Lechler  says,  "From  the  bosom  of  the  tenacious  Saxon 
people,  Wiclif  sprang  .  .  .  and  his  family  belonged  precisely 
to  those  families  of  the  lower  nobility  in  Yorkshire."* 
(G.  V.  Lechler,  John  Wiclif,  etc..  Vol.  I,  p.  124.)  These 
facts  furnish  a  genealogical  basis  for  the  spirit  of  the  man. 
His  name  is  spelled  in  at  least  twenty-eight  different  ways, 
of  which  the  one  used  at  the  heading  is  the  simplest.  This 
shows  the  literary  chaos  of  the  times.  Nor  can  the  date  of 
his  birth  be  fixed  by  documentary  evidence,  but  the  lines  of 
his  life  are  commonly  marked  by  the  years  1324-1384. 

EDUCATION    IN    THOSE  TIMES 

His  first  teachers  were  probably  parish  priests.  And 
when  he  went  to  Oxford  "University"  it  must  be  borne  in 


•  Wlclif's  part  in  the  Kreat  movement  of  breaking  down  the 
Middle  Age  conditions  has  been  so  little  understood  and  yet  is 
so  profound,  that  it  will  be  necessary  to  dwell  upon  it  with  a 
little  more  detail  than  that  of  the  other  world-modifiers.  In  his 
life  as  a  mirror  we  can  see  his  times,  their  problems,  and  the 
great  distance  civilization  has  traversed. 


40      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

mind  llial  he  was  simply  attending  a  Latin  school  at  which 
were  gathered  multitudes  of  boys  under  fourteen  years  of 
age.  It  must  also  be  remembered  that  then  the  only  source 
of  natural  and  original  thinking,  Greek  literature,  was  not 
even  yet  discovered.  There  began  to  prevail  at  Oxford  in 
the  first  half  of  the  fourteenth  century  a  special  zeal  for 
mathematical  and  physical  studies  (of  course  of  a  very  low 
order).  These  seem  to  have  taken  firm  hold  on  the  mind 
of  young  W'iclif.  There  had  lived  just  before,  and  were 
living  at  that  time,  such  men  as  Roger  Bacon*  Thomas 
Bradwardine,  John  Eastwood  and  William  Rede.  But 
Wiclif's  passion  for  knowledge  included  the  seven  liberal 
arts  and  theology,  all  intensely  traditional  and  dogmatic. 
The  course  of  theological  study  was  of  two  sorts — biblical 
and  systematic.  In  the  latter  he  seems  to  have  been  a 
faithful  student  of  the  works  of  those  scholastics,  Thomas 
Aquinas,  Robert  Grossetcie,  and  Richard  Fitzralph.  It  is 
highly  probable  that  his  student  life  occupied  at  least  ten 
years  and  it  may  have  extended  to  sixteen  or  seventeen. 
We  find  hirn  Master  of  Balliol  in  the  year  1361.  In  1365 
he  was  appointed  warden,  head  master,  or  president,  of 
Canterbury  Hall,  a  newly  founded  college  at  Oxford. 

A  few  }ears  after  this  a  controversy  arose  regarding  the 
payment  to  the  pope  by  the  English  of  a  thousand  marks 
annual  quit-rent.  W^iclif  entered  into  public  affairs  and 
took  the  side  against  its  payment.  This  position  placed  him 
in  more  unfavorable  light  with  the  pope.  Besides,  in  the 
course  of  this  trial,  he  showed  his  determination  to  make 
the  Holy  .Scripture  the  ultimate  standard  of  all  law. 

Probably  in  the  year  1372  he  received  the  degree  of  doctor 
of  theology,  after  which  he  soon  acquired  a  mighty  influence 
by  his  lectures  and  writings,  and  daily  took  still  stronger 
ground  against  the  corruptions  of  the  Church. 

*  Ro^jor  Bacon  was  the  first  original  mind,  kindred  in  spirit 
to  our  Modoin  Science. 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III     41 

wiclif's  patriotic  career 

Previous  to  the  year  1365  or  1366,  Wiclif  was  only  a 
quiet  scholar.  As  fellow  and  seneschal  of  Merton  College, 
as  Master  of  Balliol,  as  warden  of  Canterbury  Hall,  he  had 
proved  himself  upright,  circumspect,  of  energetic  habits,  and 
possessed  of  practical  talent.  His  many-sided  mind  now 
began  to  participate  in  affairs  of  state,  especially  in  defend- 
ing the  rights  of  the  kingdom  against  the  court  of  Rome. 
His  works  evince  the  warmest  patriotism.  He  frequently 
recalls  the  memories  of  events  in  English  History,  and 
manifests  the  most  immediate  concern  in  the  welfare,  liber- 
ties and  honor  of  the  nation;  besides,  his  philanthropic  heart 
went  out  beyond  his  own  little  island  to  the  rest  of  the  world. 

Urban  V,  in  1365,  renewed  the  papal  claim  upon  Edward 
III  for  an  unusual  payment  of  one  thousand  marks  as 
feudatory  tribute,  and  also  the  pa}ment  of  arrearages  for 
thirty-three  years.  This  tax  was  first  imposed  upon  the 
English  crown  in  the  reign  of  King  John  (1199-1216)  by 
Innocent  III.  It  had  been  discontinued  for  a  long  time 
v.ithout  remonstrance.  At  this  juncture  Edward  III  eagerly 
and  wisely  laid  the  claim  before  his  parliament,  expecting 
its  repudiation,  and  with  this  the  support  of  the  kingdom 
in  resisting  papal  demands.  The  rising  spirit  of  nationality 
caused  the  "Lords  Spiritual  and  temporal  along  with  the 
commons"  to  unite  in  opposing  the  papal  assumption  upon 
the  ground  that  King  John  had  acted  beyond  his  authority 
in  subjecting  the  realm  without  its  consent.  Moreover,  the 
lords  and  commons  promised  the  king  the  support  of  the 
whole  national  resources,  if  needed,  to  defencl  the  dignity 
of  the  crown.  The  papacy  understood  the  meaning  of  such 
a  spirit,  and  from  that  time  to  this,  Rome  has  never 
attempted  feudal  superiority  over  England.  In  this  resist- 
ance Wiclif  took  an  important  part.  In  answer  to  a 
vehement  anonymous  document  aimed  particularly  at  him 
from  the  papal  side,  he  wrote  a  most  interesting  tract  pur- 
porting to  gi\e  the  "Vicivs  of  Sctcii  Lords  in  ParUaincnt." 
This  little  document  was  the  first  slalzvart  modern  blow  at 


42      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

custom  and  tyranny,  both  of  Church  and  State.  More  than 
any  other  one  thbuj,  it  zvos  the  beginning  of  the  Great 
Reformation. 

For  this  reason  the  points  are  of  great  interest  here. 

The  first  Lord  takes  the  ground  that  might  is  right,  and 
therefore  if  the  pope's  claim  is  right  he  must  sustain  it  by 
force. 

The  second,  that  a  tax  can  only  be  paid  to  a  person 
authorized  to  collect  it,  and  the  pope  is  simply  a  religious 
officer,  and  as  such,  in  imitation  of  Christ,  he  has  no  claim 
to  worldly  dominion. 

The  third,  that  taxes  should  be  paid  only  for  services 
rendered.  The  pope  does  not  build  up  the  realm  either 
temporally  or  spiritually,  but  on  the  contrary  appropriates 
its  temporalities  for  the  court  at  Rome. 

The  fourth,  that  instead  of  the  king  being  the  pope's 
vassal,  the  pope  is  the  king's  vassal,  for  the  pope  is  only 
clerical  lord  over  one-third  of  the  lands,  and  thus  his  lord- 
ship must  be  less  than  that  of  the  king,  therefore  he  is 
vassal  to  the  king;  and  since  he  has  always  neglected  his 
duty  as  the  king's  vassal  he  has  forfeited  his  rights. 

The  fifth,  that  the  Church  has  no  right  to  take  money  for 
absolution,  i.  e.,  it  ought  not  to  practice  simony.  "Freely 
ye  have  received,  freely  give,"  (Matt.  X,  8).  The  nation 
ought  not  to  suffer  the  king's  sins,  for  this  would  seem  to  be 
mstigated  by  avarice  or  usurpation  rather  than  justice. 

The  sixth,  that  if  the  pope  had  a  legal  right  to  make  over 
the  kmgdom  to  John,  he  did  very  wrong  to  give  away  so 
much  church  property  for  so  small  an  income,  and  thus  he 
detrauded  the  Church,  and  another  might  at  his  pleasure 
demand  It  back  agam  under  this  pretense  of  previous  fraud 
or  bad  bargam.  "It  is  necessary  then  to  oppose  the  first 
begmnmg  of  this  mischief,  and  we  therefore  hold  our  king- 
Param^ount '^''^'  immediately  from  Christ  who  is  the  Lord 

hvTL\'f'''"  n'  *''^^  •'  '^^'^^  ill-considered  treaty,  brought  on 
with  constitutional  right  be  allowed  to  operate  mischievously 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III     43 

These  speeches  are  substantially  embodied  in  the  act  of 
parliament  of  May,  1366,  which  sustained  the  position  of 
King  Edward.  (Wiclif  must  have  written  this  tract  while 
he  retained  his  position  at  the  head  of  Canterbury  Hall.) 

The  next  we  hear  of  him  is  his  connection  with  an 
embassy  of  Edward  III  in  1374,  to  treat  with  commissaries 
from  Pope  Gregory  XI,  at  Bruges,  concerning  certain  high 
offices  in  England  given  to  Italians.  The  embassy  held 
plenary  power  to  conclude  such  a  treaty  as  shall  "at  once 
secure  the  honor  of  the  Church  and  uphold  the  rights  of 
the  English  crown  and  realm." 

The  fact  that  the  grievances  of  the  "Good  Parliament" 
of  April,  1376,  (of  which  Wiclif  was  a  member)  were 
louder  and  bolder  than  those  before,  proved  that  nothing 
of  permanent  value  was  accomplished  at  Bruges. 

In  1377  he  put  forth  a  paper  concerning  the  sworn  obli- 
gations of  the  papal  receiver,  Gamier,  the  nuncio  of  Gregory 
XI,  who  was  then  collecting  funds  in  England.  This 
Gamier  came  with  a  train  of  servants  and  six  horses. 
Before  commencing  his  tour  of  the  kingdom,  he  had,  without 
the  slightest  scruple,  taken  an  oath  in  which  the  interests 
of  the  crown  and  kingdom  were  protected  on  all  sides.  In 
this  paper  Wiclif  accuses  the  pope's  agent  of  perjury,  in 
taking  an  oath  not  to  violate  the  rights  and  interest  of  the 
country  and  at  the  same  time  collecting,  in  order  to  carry 
away,  a  large  amount  of  gold.  He  also  shows  up  the  incon- 
sistent action  of  the  state  in  granting  this  permission  and 
at  the  same  time  pretending  to  guard  the  interests  of  the 
country. 

These  attacks  not  only  tell  the  doings  of  a  wonderful  man, 
but  reveal  conditions  which  are  hard  for  us  to  understand. 
Those  strange  "Dark  Ages"  in  which  a  pompous  religious 
institution  dictated  absolutely  every  phase  of  life  and  death, 
meddled  in  all  affairs  of  every  state,  and  whose  doctrinal 
head  claimed  to  be  lord  of  all  lords  and  king  of  all  kings! 
And  yet  the  modern  spirit  is  dawning.  Here  is  a  simple 
Englishman,  who,  without  the  prestige  of  aristocracy,  by 
mere  force  of  character  and  knowledge,  dares  to  tell  the 


44      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Pope  of  his  sins  and  refuses  to  obey  his  august  commands. 
This  anti-Roman  activity  at  this  period  was  truly  wonderful. 
How  original  and  courageous,  we  can  scarcely  know. 

At  this  period,  the  political  alliance  of  IViclif  with  the 
duke  of  Lancaster  party,  together  with  his  outspoken  bold- 
ness on  church  reform,  brought  him  twice  in  one  year  before 
the  spiritual  tribunals.  The  duke  (the  famous  John  of 
Gaunt,  second  son  of  Edward  III)  determined  to  protect 
Wiclif,  and  on  the  19th  of  February,  1377,  when  he  appeared 
before  the  convocation  in  London,  he  was  accompanied  by 
the  duke  and  grand  marshal,  and  a  band  of  armed  men. 
This  meeting  terminated  in  a  general  uproar,  and  nothing 
was  accomplished  except  an  increase  of  hatred  between  the 
duke  and  the  clergy.  Meanwhile  the  episcopate  was  stirring 
up  the  see  of  Rome  against  Wiclif  as  an  alleged  teacher  of 
heresy,  and  for  this  purpose  they  had  collected  and  sent  to 
Rome  many  of  his  doctrinal  propositions.  That  the  problem 
of  how  to  trap  him  had  been  ripely  considered,  is  evident 
from  the  fact  that  no  less  than  five  papal  bulls  against  him 
were  issued  in  one  day. 

Meanwhile,  Edward  III  dies  (June  21,  1377),  the  yoiuuj 
Richard  II  is  crozvned,  the  French  attack  the  southern  coasts 
in  August,  the  Scots  assume  a  threatening  aspect  in  the 
North,  the  regency  is  unsettled,  the  new  parliament  is  anti- 
R(jman  and  with  the  zeal  of  its  predecessor  renews  its 
complaints.  Wiclif,  acknowledged  spokesman,  drew  up  an 
opinion  for  the  young  kinr/  and  his  great  council.  In  this 
he  takes  a  decided  stand  in  favor  of  the  lawful  competency 
of  the  kingdom  to  hinder  the  treasure  of  the  land  from  being 
carried  ofif.  He  supports  his  view  by  appeals  to  the  law  of 
nature,  to  the  Scriptures,  and  to  conscience.  He  cites 
attention  to  the  objects  for  which  this  treasure  is  carried 
ofiF,  and  to  the  ridicule  to  which  pjiglishmen  would  be  sub- 
jected in  consequence  of  their  "asinine  stupidity." 

After  this  parliament  was  prorogued,  the  prelates  of 
London  set  about  the  execution  of  the  papal  order  which 
they  had  jufliciously  deferred  until  a  more  opportune 
occasion.     They  now  instructed  the  chancellor  of  the  uni- 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III     45 

versity  to  make  the  inquiries;  and,  if  true,  he  was  to  cite 
Widif  to  appear  within  thirty  days  before  the  prelate  in 
St.  Paul's.  It  is  noteworthy  of  Wiclif's  standing  that  they 
do  not  conform  to  the  instructions  given,  viz.,  to  put  him  in 
prison;  and  so  also  is  the  entreating  tone  in  which  they 
addressed  the  chancellor,  thus  showing  a  possible  doubt  as 
to  the  good  disposition  of  the  university  toward  the  papacy. 
And  thus  it  turned  out  that  the  state  of  feeling  at  Oxford 
was  entirely  unfavorable  to  their  project.  In  concurrence 
with  the  lothfully  given  summons  of  the  chancellor,  Wiclif 
appeared  before  the  archbishop,  not  in  St.  Paul's,  but  at  his 
palace  in  Lambeth.  Demands  from  the  nobles,  however, 
instigated  by  the  princess  regent,  and  threats  from  the 
common  people,  caused  him  to  go  away  as  free  as  he  came, 
with  the  simple  exception  that  he  was  prohibited  from  de- 
livering in  lectures  or  sermons  the  questioned  theses,  but  to 
this  Wiclif  did  not  himself  agree!  The  affairs  of  the  year 
had  the  effect  of  inflaming  his  earnest  and  free  spirit  to  full 
strength,  and  of  bringing  to  light  "how  many  hearts  were 
beating  in  sympathy  with  him  and  his  efforts."  Then  too, 
there  occurred  coincidently  and  opportunely,  that  Great 
Papal  Scliis)}]  which  caused  to  totter  the  little  moral  prestige 
that  was  left  to  the  Roman  Church  (1378-T417).  Thus 
from  the  year  1378,  we  fmd  Wiclif's  attention  devoted  en- 
tirely to  ecclesiastical  matters,  and  therefore  he  appears  in 
the  specific  character  of  a  church  reformer. 

wiri.ir's  WORK  as  a  church  modifier 

A  few  days  after  the  last  arraignment,  on  March  27th, 
^37^.  Gregory  XI  died  at  Rome,  and  twelve  days  later  the 
archbishop  of  Bari  was  elected  to  the  tiara  as  Urban  VI. 
Mis  first  acts  caused  the  hope  to  rise  in  the  minds  of  many 
that  he  would  himself  undertake  a  reform.  But  alas!  too 
sof»n  these  hopes  were  blasted.  His  "well-meant  but  incon- 
siderate zeal"  separated  from  him  a  number  of  the  cardinals, 
who  in  July  declared  his  election  illegal  and  elected  another 
pope,  Clement  VII.     Both  parties  now  looked  to  England 


46      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

for  support,  but  the  Church  there  continued  its  adherence 
to  Urban  VI ;  even  Wichf  himself  for  a  time  was  inclined  to 
the  cause  of  Urban,  as  we  infer  from  one  of  his  sermons 
somewhat  later.  But  the  conduct  of  the  rival  popes  tended 
to  confirm  his  former  conviction,  that  the  papal  office  zvas 
a  nuisance,  the  "anti-Christ"  of  Scripture.  He  was  now 
well  on  the  way  toward  his  complete  severance  from  papal 
adherence.  The  spirit  of  righteousness  rose  up  within  him 
and  burst  the  bonds  of  partizanship.  Each  pope  publicly, 
solemnly,  and  in  God's  name  declared  his  opponent  as  "a 
false  pretended  pope,"  damned  him  as  a  schismatic,  and 
Wiclif  said  that  both  were  right  in  their  judgments  of  each 
other.  Everywhere,  in  his  works,  lectures  and  sermons,  he 
spoke  out  without  reserve  against  the  violence  of  both 
parties.  Each,  in  demanding  the  death  of  the  other  and  his 
supporters,  practically  admitted  the  right  of  every  Christian 
to  put  his  fellow  Christian  to  death.  Taking  it  all  in  all, 
Wiclif  saw  in  the  schism  a  providence  to  unbind  men  en- 
tirely from  papal  fetters. 

After  the  year  1381,  after  this  immense  change  had  taken 
place  in  Wiclif's  mind,  his  work  of  translating  the  Bible 
was  pushed  forward  with  increased  zeal  and  was  com,pleted 
probably  in  1382.  This  was  the  first  Bible  in  a  modern 
tongue.  Its  influence  cannot  be  overestimated.  By  this 
instrumentality  he  hoped  to  spread  "the  simple  truth" 
throughout  the  land.  This  was  a  labor  directly  for  the 
people  who  only  learned  of  Bible  teachings  from  an  ignorant 
and  bigoted  priesthood. 

It  was  also  no  doubt  between  the  years  1378  and  1382 
that  the  training  and  sending  out  of  his  evangelical  Itinerant 
Preachers  began,  for  in  the  spring  of  1382  they  had  roused 
the  attention  of  the  church  judicatories.  This  too  was  a 
work  the  importance  of  which  it  is  not  easy  to  estimate. 
Wiclif  had  already  begun  his  attack  upon  the  church  doc- 
trine. He  must  inevitably  have  been  led  into  this  by  his 
stern  appeal  to  Scripture  as  a  criterion,  assisted  by  his 
external  freedom  because  of  the  Papal  Schism. 

In  the  summer  of  1381  he  published  twelve  short  theses 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III    47 

upon  the  Lord's  Supper  and  against  "transubstantiation" 
as  unscriptural,  groundless,  and  erroneous.  Of  course,  this 
was  a  step  absolutely  irreconcilable  with  the  dogmas  of  the 
Romish  Church.  How  far  we  are  from  that  Middle  Age 
quibbling  we  feel  when  we  learn  that  this  "produced  a  pro- 
digious sensation  in  Oxford" !  The  chancellor  called  to- 
gether a  council  of  twelve  of  the  doctors  of  law  and  divinity 
and  unanimously  pronounced  the  substance  of  these  theses 
to  be  erroneous  and  heretical.  Then  came  a  mandate  which 
did  not  mention  W'iclif  but  condemned  the  doctrines  and 
forbade  their  being  taught  on  pain  of  dismission,  excom- 
munication, and  imprisonment.  This  order  was  read  by  the 
officers  in  Wiclif's  own  lecture  room  and  in  his  presence, 
and  it  is  said  that  at  that  very  hour  he  was  commenting  upon 
the  doctrine  of  the  eucharist.  Upon  hearing  it,  he  immedi- 
ately stated  that  "neither  the  chancellor  nor  any  of  his 
colleagues  had  the  power  to  alter  his  convictions."  He 
appealed  to  King  Richard  II ;  but  was  obliged  to  refrain 
from  lecturing  on  these  subjects  at  the  university.  How- 
ever, this  did  not  stop  his  writing. 

The  same  year,  1381,  will  ever  be  remembered  in  England 
for  the  terrible  "Peasant  War,"  a  social  revolution  in  which 
the  peasants,  to  use  the  language  of  Jack  Straw,  one  of 
their  leaders,  "would  have  ended  by  taking  the  life  of  the 
king,  and  by  exterminating  out  of  the  earth  all  land  holders, 
bishops,  landed  monks,  endowed  canons,  and  parish  priests." 
Among  the  illustrious  prey  of  this  mob  revolt  was  Simon 
Sudbury,  archbishop  of  Canterbury.  The  office  was  next 
filled  by  William  Courtenay,  bishop  of  London.  This  man 
was  "a  zealot  for  the  papacy,  an  energetic  and  domineering 
churchman,"  and  was  the  man  who  in  1377  had  set  on  foot 
the  inquiry  against  Wiclif.  With  his  increased  power  he 
began  the  work  of  crushing  the  constantly  increasing 
strength  of  the  Wiclifite  party. 

A  little  later  another  royal  patent  led  to  the  banishment 
from  the  university  of  "every  member  who  receives,  bears 
favor  to,  or  has  intercourse  with  Dr.  John  Wiclif,  Nicholas 
Herefonl,  Philip  Repington,  John   Aston,  or  any  one  else 


48      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

of  the  same  party."  Besides  this,  all  the  halls  and  colleges 
were  to  be  searched  for  books  and  tracts  by  Wiclif  and 
Hereford.  Since  the  first  royal  patent  was  issued  the  per- 
secution of  the  itinerant  preachers  had  been  going  on. 
Hereford,  Repington,  r.edeman,  and  Aston  concealed  them- 
selves for  some  months;  finally  the  last  three  were  appre- 
hended anil  one  after  another  were  brought  to  recant. 
Hereford  went  to  Rome  to  place  his  case  before  the  pope, 
who  condemned  his  conduct  and  imprisoned  him  for  life; 
but  in  1385  he  was  unexpectedly  released  by  a  tumult  in 
Nocera  where  the  pope  was  beseiged  by  King  Charles  of 
Sicily. 

One  leader  only  stood  firm,  independent  and  unattacked 
in  this  period  of  alarm.  His  "Articles"  had  been  branded, 
and  multitudes  had  suffered  for  their  complicity ;  but  the 
leader  still  preaches  away  to  his  parishoners  at  Lutterworth. 
Language  has  been  exhausted  in  efforts  to  tarnish  his  honor 
and  destroy  his  influence.  Yet  this  "arch  heretic,"  this 
"anti-Christ,"  "still  possessed  the  right  of  delivering  lectures, 
conducting  disputations,  and  preaching  before  the 
university." 

wiclif's  last  days 

He  was  permitted  to  live  his  last  two  years  in  comparative 
quiet  and  mcniy-sided  literary  activity  at  his  Lutterworth 
parish.  Although  no  longer  surrounded  by  the  old  leaders, 
yet  he  did  not  want  in  these  declining  years  for  constant  and 
confidential  fellow-workers.  The  most  noted  and  active  of 
these  were  John  Horn  and  John  Purvey.  During  this 
period  very  probably  were  written  the  English  sermons 
which  have  come  down  to  us.  About  this  time,  when  the 
preaching  itinerancy  was  so  menaced  by  the  bishops,  Wiclif 
more  zealously  undertook  the  task  of  instructing  the  people 
by  short  and  simple  tracts  in  the  English  tongue.  (We  will 
bear  in  mind  that  this  was  a  hundred  years  before  the 
invention  of  printing  came  into  use.) 

In   a   Latin   tract,   "Cruciata  Seu   Contra  Bellum    Cleri- 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III     49 

corum,"  he  compares  the  schism  between  the  two  popes  to 
a  quarrel  of  two  dogs  over  a  bone,  and  calls  upon  princes 
to  take  away  the  bone — i.  e.,  the  worldly  power  of  the  papacy 
from  both.  So  far  is  he  from  being  intimidated  that  in  the 
very  next  year  after  the  archbishop's  inquisitorial  proceed- 
ings against  him  and  his  party,  he  inveighs  in  the  most 
fearless  and  emphatic  manner  against  both  popes  and  the 
crusades  advised  by  Urban  VI,  sanctioned  by  the  archbishop 
himself,  and  headed  by  an  English  bishop,  and,  astonishing 
as  it  may  seem,  he  even  had  the  courage  to  address  a  missive 
to  the  primate  in  which  he  informs  him  that  "neither  the 
slaying  of  men  nor  the  imprisonment  of  whole  countries  is 
the  outcome  of  love  to  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ." 

It  was  on  December  31,  1384,  that  the  brave,  heroic  and 
upright  Johannes  de  Wiclif  escaped  forevermore  the  tyran- 
nical bigotry  of  the  Romish  hierarchy.  But  this  did  not 
end  the  controversy  he  started.  The  Council  of  Constance 
in  1413  condemned  forty-five  of  his  "Articles"  as  heretical, 
false,  and  erroneous,  and  ordered  that  his  bones  be  dug  up 
and  cast  on  a  dunghill;  and  in  1428,  after  a  rest  of  forty- 
four  years,  the  venom  and  vengeance  of  Roman  intolerance 
glutted  itself  when,  in  addition  to  the  most  diabolical 
anathemas,  his  remains  were  inhumanly  unearthed,  burned 
and  their  ashes  cast  into  the  adjoining  Brook  Swift,  from 
zi'hich,  as  Fuller  in  prose  and  Wordsworth  in  poetry  have 
sa:d,  they  were  borne  through  Avon  into  Severn,  from 
Severn  into  the  sea,  and  thus  disseminated  over  the  world. 

"Wiclif  i.s  di.sinhumed, 
Yea,  his  dry  bone.s  to  ashes  are  consumed, 
And  flung  into  the  brook  that  travels  near: 
Forthwith  that  ancient  voice  which  streams  can  hear, 
Thus  speaks-- (that  voice  wliicli  walks  upon  the  wind, 
Though  seldom  heard  by  busy  human  kind) : 
As  thou  these  ashes,  little  brook,  wilt  bear 
Into  the  Avon — Avon  to  the  tide 
Of  Severn     Severn  to  the  narrow  seas — 
Into  main  ocean  thf-y-  this  deed  accurst 
An  emblem  yields  to  friends  and  enemies, 
Mow  the  bold  teacher's  doctrine,  sanctified 
By  truth,  shall  spread  throughout  the  world  dispersed." 


50      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

CHARACTER  OF  WICLIF 

Wiclif  must  be  judged  in  the  light  of  his  own  times  and 
not  by  that  of  today.  In  intellectual  pre-eminence  he  is 
signally  contrasted  with  Euther,  who  was  so  much  a  man 
of  feeling.  Both  opponents  and  adherents  "look  upon  him 
as  having  no  living  equal  in  learning  and  scientific  ability." 
It  was  surely  the  proud  consciousness  of  intellectual  power 
which  prompted  him  to  say :  "Since  there  are  few  wise  men, 
and  fools  are  without  number,  the  assent  of  the  greater  part 
of  mankind  to  an  assertion  only  goes  to  show  its  folly." 
His  sermons  and  discourses  are  frequently  illustrated  by 
mathematical,  physical,  naturalistic,  and  social  ideas.  The 
critical  spirit  of  Wiclif  was  far  beyond  the  average  for  the 
period;  and  hence  his  frequent  contemptuous  utterances 
concerning  the  subtleties  on  which  men  dwelt  so  much,  the 
usurpations  of  the  papacy,  the  abuses  of  the  hierarchy  in 
general,  and  the  foolishness  of  many  particulars  in  Roman 
Catholic  worship  and  doctrines.  "It  was  for  him  to  tug  at 
the  wheels  of  reform  in  the  steepest  of  the  ascent,  to  infuse 
into  others  his  earnest  undissembled  spirit,"  "to  serve  his 
country,  his  God  and  his  Savior  by  bringing  souls  from  the 
thraldom  of  Roman  superstition  into  enlightened  Christian 
liberty."  "He  clearly  anticipated,"  says  David  Irving,  "the 
most  distinguished  doctrines  of  the  Protestants,  and  his 
opinions  on  certain  points  present  an  obvious  coincidence 
with  those  of  Calvin."  Milton  remarks  in  his  Areopagitica, 
"Had  it  not  been  for  the  obstinate  perverseness  of  our 
prelates  against  the  divine  and  admirable  spirit  of  Wiclif, 
to  suppress  him  as  a  schismatic  and  innovator,  perhaps 
neither  the  Bohemian  Huss  and  Jerome,  no,  nor  the  name 
of  Luther  or  of  Calvin,  had  ever  been  known,  and  the  glory 
of  reforming  our  neighbors  had  been  completely  ours." 

HIS    REFORMATIONAL    WORK    AND    INFLUENCE 

In  his  attack  upon  church  doctrine  he  first  clearly  and 
learnedly  emphasized  the  fundamental,  early  "Protestant" 
principle  that  Holy  Scripture  alone  is  the  infallible  and 
absolute  standard  of  truth.     Next,  he  applies  it  to  actual 


THE  BEGINNING  OF  PROTEST  IN  ACT  III     51 

life  by  the  institution  of  Biblical  "itinerant  preaching,"  by 
the  English  translation  of  the  Bible,  by  scripture  commen- 
taries, and  by  popular  tracts.  His  fiery  zeal  is  now  awak- 
ened and  the  dominant  theology  must  be  tested.  The 
doctrine  of  the  sacraments  is  examined,  and  in  particular  the 
article  of  transubstantiation  in  the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's 
Supper  is  overturned.  By  his  Scripture  test,  Christ  alone 
becomes  our  Mediator,  Savior,  and  Leader;  and  therefore 
is  the  only  legitimate  and  governing  head  of  his  Church. 
Surely  here  is  sufficient  refutation  of  the  saying  of  Luther, 
that  "Wiclif  and  Huss  had  attacked  only  the  life  of  the 
church  under  the  papacy,  whereas  he  fought  not  so  much 
against  the  life  as  the  doctrine." 

Looking  backward  we  find  that  what  Arnold  of  Brescia, 
what  the  Waldensian  communion,  what  Francis  of  Assisi, 
what  the  Mendicant  Orders,  what  St  Bernard  and  others 
had  so  devoutly  sought  to  bring  about — viz,  "the  return  of 
the  Church  of  Christ  to  an  apostolic  life  and  walk" — -this 
burned  in  the  soul  of  Wiclif  in  his  early  public  labor.  But 
in  him  there  was  added  the  modern  idea  of  "The  State." 
This  he  utilized  with  great  force  toward  the  grand  object  of 
church  reform. 

The  attention  paid  to  him  and  his  ideas  by  his  enemies 
is  a  fine  proof  of  the  greatness  of  his  work.  They  claim 
that  he  comprehended  in  his  person  all  previous  "heretical 
notions,"  which  is  nearly  synonymous  with  what  Protestants 
would  call  previous  reforms.  Alzog,  a  recent  Catholic 
historian  of  high  authority,  says  (Univ.  Ch.  Hist.  II,  947)  : 
"John  Wiclif  seems  to  have  been  a  representative  of  every 
false  principle  of  philosophy  and  every  erroneous  doctrine 
of  theology  current  during  this  age  and  throughout  the 
Church  of  the  West."  His  doctrines  were  carried  into 
Bohemia  and  became  the  origin  of  the  Hussite  Movement. 
How  potent  his  influence  was  felt  to  have  been  by  his 
adversaries  immediately  after  his  time,  may  be  judged  from 
the  following  words  of  Thomas  IValsinghain,  a  chronicler 
of  that  age:  "On  the  feast  of  the  i)assion  of  St  Thomas  of 
Canterbury  [a  mistake,  as  it  was  on  Innocents'  Day],  John 


52      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Wiclif — that  organ  of  the  devil,  that  enemy  of  the  Church, 
that  autlior  of  confusion  to  the  common  people,  that  idol 
of  heretics,  that  image  of  hypocrites,  that  restorer  of  schism, 
that  storehouse  of  lies,  that  sink  of  flattery — being  struck 
by  the  horrible  judgment  of  God,  was  struck  with  palsy, 
and  continued  to  live  in  that  condition  until  St.  Sylvester's 
Day,  on  which  he  breathed  out  his  malicious  spirit  into  the 
abodes  of  darkness." 

Against  such  bigoted  and  baseless  innuendos  the 
historic  artist  of  today,  at  a  point  of  distance  five  hundred 
years  removed,  contrasts  the  timely  work  of  Wiclif,  and  the 
enduring  substance  of  the  latter  completely  overshadows  the 
shifting  mockery  of  the  former. 

Professor  Lechler  of  Leipsic,  his  latest,  most  appreciative, 
and,  by  far  most  original  and  thorough  biographer,  admir- 
ably says  of  him:  "In  the  collective  history  of  the  Church 
of  Christ,  Wiclif  marks  an  epoch  .  .  .  He  is  the  first 
important  personality  in  history  zvho  devotes  himself  to  the 
zvork  of  church  reform  zvith  the  entire  thought  power  of  a 
master  mind  and  with  the  full  force  of  will  and  joyful  self- 
sacrifice  of  a  man  of  Christ."  (John  Wiclif,  etc.  Eng. 
ed.  IT,  347.)  "John  Wiclif  appears  to  us  to  be  the  center  of 
the  whole  pre-Reformation  history.  In  him  meet  a  multi- 
tude of  converging  lines,  and  from  him  again  go  forth 
manifold  influences,  like  wave  pulses  which  spread  them- 
selves widely  on  every  side,  and  with  a  force  so  persistent 
that  we  are  able  to  fo'llow  the  traces  of  their  presence  to  a 
later  date  than  the  commencement  of  the  German  Reforma- 
tion."    (The  same,  I,  14.) 

John  Wiclif  started  the  movement  and  broke  the  way  that 
will  lead  all  mankind,  sooner  or  later,  out  of  tradition  and 
into  continuous  progress. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  NEXT  GREAT  PROTEST— ACT  IV 

BEGUN  400  YEARS  AGO— NOW  SPREADING 

WORLD    WIDE 

Martin  Luther  1483- 1546 

the  middle  age  situation 

Long  before  the  time  of  Luther's  outburst  (1517)  Church 
and  State  (as  we  have  already  seen)  had  become  thoroughly 
assimilated  in  every  political  body  of  Europe.  Every  insti- 
tution was  blended  in  its  very  nature  with  the  Church,  and 
Europe  was  for  centuries  in  the  bonds  of  an  absolute 
theocracy.  To  such  an  extent  had  this  assimilation  gone 
on  that  a  shock  to  the  doctrines  of  the  Church  could  not 
fail  to  convulse  society  in  every  part.  The  pope  asserted 
a  two-fold  subjection  of  every  soul  in  Christendom — as 
spiritual  head  domineering  through  the  hierarchy;  indirectly, 
as  temporal  head  swaying  the  kings  of  nations  by  the  Holy 
Roman  PLmpire.  The  feeble  monarchs  of  France,  England, 
Sweden,  Denmark,  and  the  princes  of  the  small  states  and 
free  cities  of  Germany,  had  for  centuries  made  an 
inefifectual  resistance  to  papal  encroachment.  But  at  the 
beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  a  change  brought  about 
by  the  growth  of  a  more  national  spirit  in  each  country 
presented  a  formidable  front  to  the  tiara  which  was  now 
becoming  di/.zy  by  its  long,  successful  ascendency. 

OPEN   REVOLT  ONLY  A    MATTER  OF  TIME 

Although  the  Reformation  is  a  great  and  dominant  cause 
in  modern  history,  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  like  all 
other  events,  it  was  itself  an  effect  of  previous  causes.     It 

53 


54      A    KliCKlVERSHlP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

was  bul  uuc  of  the  larger  ares  of  ihc  ever-aspiring  human 
ideal  approaching  the  moral  asymptote.  //  was  hut  one 
mighty  throe  of  writhing  and  struggling  humanity  to  free 
itself  from  ihc  tyranny  of  moral  bondage.  It  was  but  one 
of  the  continued  succession  of  reformations  in  the  progress 
of  civilization,  some — indeed  most  of  them — are  silent  and 
slow,  this  one  loud,  quick,  pozvcrful,  and  brilliant.  The  fuse 
that  was  lighted  in  the  mind  of  Wiclif  burned  on  and  on,  till, 
reaching  a  magazine  in  l.uther,  it  rent  the  world  of  super- 
stition by  an  explosion  which  threw  the  light  of  knowledge 
over  all  succeeding  ages. 

TJie  tzvo  objects  nozv  groivn  to  he  most  dear  to  the  heart 
of  man,  are  the  maintenance  of  his  social  rights  and  the 
independence  of  his  religious  opinions — liberty  of  civil 
action  and  liberty  of  conscience.  Humanity  has  suffered 
so  much  from  tyranny  that  these  nearly  equal  the  sum  of 
tolerable  existence.  Man's  enthusiasm  knows  no  limits  at 
the  hope  of  their  recovery ;  his  despair  is  unfathomable  at 
the  prospect  of  their  loss.  Such  hope  and  prospect  stared 
in  the  face  the  nations  of  Europe  at  the  beginning  of  the 
sixteenth  century.  The  flood  of  ignorance  which  the 
barbaric  inundation  swept  over  the  already  diluted  mind  of 
southern  Europe  left  a  solution  so  weak  as  scarcely  to  con- 
tain a  crystal  of  improvement.  Gradually,  as  the  reagent 
of  time  did  its  work,  the  scanty  knowledge  crystalized  in  the 
form  of  a  dull  scholasticism  in  the  cloisters  of  monks.  For 
centuries  "study  was  rendered  as  inaccessible  as  possible 
to  the  laity;  that  of  ancient  languages  (except  Latin)  was 
treated  as  a  monstrosity  and  an  idolatry."  "Roman  Catholi- 
cism was  diametrically  opposed  to  the  progress  of  know- 
ledge." (See  Villers,  "Spirit  and  Influence  of  the 
Reformation,"  pp  89,  186.)  But  day  infallibly  follows 
night.  The  sun  of  knowledge  must  arise.  Its  light  reveals 
the  ridiculous  garb  and  antics  of  men  in  mental  darkness. 
The  irrepressible  tendency  to  know  was  rapidly  giving  itself 
the  means  in  the  newly  founded  universities.  The  unveiling 
of  a  New  World  had  piqued  inquisitiveness,  and  the  dis- 
covery of  the  art  of  printing  had  furnished  the  means  of 


THE  NEXT  GREAT  PROTEST       55 

its  gratification  to  millions.  From  the  banks  of  the  Vistula, 
Copernicus  ( 1543)  has  spied  out  the  courses  of  the  heavenly 
orbs,  and  Kepler  and  Newton  afterwards  furnished  their 
laws,  neither  of  which  have  pontifical  bulls  been  able  to 
revoke.* 

Not  a  little  fuel  was  added  to  the  fire  of  excitement  by 
the  keen  satires  of  Erasnius  of  Rotterdam.  His  mirth- 
making  book,  "The  Praise  of  Folly,"  was  directed  against 
the  sensuality  and  stupidity  of  the  clergy.  Ulrich  von 
Hutten,  a  young  Franconian  nobleman  of  ardent  spirits  and 
fine  ability — warrior,  poet,  theologian,  and  litterateur, 
heaped  mountains  of  ridicule  upon  the  clerical  body  by  his 
"Letters  of  Obscure  Men." 

THE  APPEARANCE  OF  LUTHER    (1483-I546) 

At  this  period  of  the  drama  there  came  upon  the  stage 
one  of  the  foremost  actors  of  all  history,  Martin  Luther, 
a  monk,  priest,  doctor  of  theolog>',  and  professor  in  the  new 
university  of  Wittenburg,  a  man  of  tremendous  earnestness, 
undaunted  courage,  immovable  firmness,  moral  uprightness, 
and  though  not  in  any  sense  a  man  of  Science,  yet  warmly 
devoted  to  the  study  of  the  "New  Learning"  of  those  times. 
To  the  reflecting  student  of  history,  what  momentous  conse- 
f|uences  hung  upon  the  character  of  this  man!  Had  the 
papacy  been  more  prudent,  had  the  princes  of  Germany  been 
more  indifferent,  had  Luther  been  less  inflexible,  the  child 
Protestantism  might  have  been  strangled  in  its  cradle.  So 
easy  is  it  to  doze  av.ay  life,  what  but  such  fortuitous  combi- 
nation of  circumstances  could  have  saved  all  Europe  from 
the  calamity  of  a  continued  universal  theocratic  monarchy, 
or  the  superstition  of  benighted  Spain! 

Speaking  of  the  state  of  the  European  mind  before  the 
Reformation,  Mr.  Froude  says: 


♦  Wp  shall  havo  orrasion  to  rofor  (o  fhoso  groat  pvonts  again 
and  again,  and  in  later  chapters  .show  their  nature,  setting  and 
power. 


50      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

"The  theories  and  ceremonies  of  the  Catholic  Churcli 
suited  well  with  an  age  in  which  little  was  known  and  nuuli 
was  imagined;  when  superstition  was  active  and  Science 
was  not  yet  born." 

THE  FUTILE  RESISTANCE 

But  times  change.  These  ceremonies  were  not  living,  but 
dead.  Religion  had  lost  its  hold  on  the  people.  The  people 
saw  that  the  prelates  did  not  believe  their  own  teaching, 
and  why  should  they?  But  could  not  an  infallible  Church 
have  improved  things?  It  might  indeed,  but  reform  was 
the  last  thing  which  it  wanted.  It  tried  (but  too  late)  to 
cover  its  errors  and  rnHy  its  decaying  energies.  Twenty 
five  years  after  the  explosion  of  Wittenburg,  a  solenui  con- 
clave of  theological  dignitaries  at  Trent  (1545)  voted  Ihc 
doctrines  of  heavenly  truth  (?)  and  supported  them  by  the 
invincible  arguments  of  fire  and  fagot.  But  the  spirit  of 
liberty  and  independence  which  had  burst  open  the  gatcwa\ 
of  superstition  had  fled  so  far  and  gained  so  many  adherent 
that  its  recall  was  now  ludicrous.  Tn  vain  did  pope  and 
bishop  in  bigoted  seclusion  thunder  their  protests  and  pro 
scriptions.  And  since  the  dazvn  of  this  reform,  bulls  of 
anathema  ha7>e  issued  from  Rome  against  every  published 
work  of  doctrine,  philosbpJiy,  science,  history,  or  f/cucral 
literature  which  coidd  be  supposed  directly  or  indirectly  Ik 
counteract  popish  assertions  or  curtail  popish  authority. 

A  single  illustration  of  this  narrow  and  oppressive  spirit. 
Near  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  missionary 
LeConite  published  his  "Nouveaux  Memoires  sur  I'etai 
present  dc  la  Chine,"  in  which  he  had  the  candor  to  sa\ 
what  he  thought,  namely,  that  "the  Chinese  had  adored  tli'- 
true  God  for  two  thousand  years;  that,  among  nations,  they 
were  the  first  who  had  sacrificed  to  their  Creator  and  taughl 
a  true  morality."  Such  a  clamor  as  resulted  from  this 
publication  is  to  us  inconceivable.  The  Sorbonne  of  Paris 
condemned  the  book  and  the  feeble  French  Parliament 
ordered  the  hangman  to  tear  and  burn  it ! 


THE  NEXT  GREAT  PROTEST  57 

For  a  time  during  the  intense  excitement  of  men  over 
religious  topics,  during  the  heat  of  the  Reformation  struggle, 
the  studies  in  which  the  humanists,  or  lovers  of  advanced 
thought,  were  so  much  delighted,  attracted  much  less  atten- 
tion than  in  the  period  just  preceding  the  breaking  out  of 
the  trouble  between  Luther  and  the  pope. 

Medieval  philosophy  was  the  handmaid  of  theology,  and 
all  knowledge  zvas  the  abused  monopoly  of  the  clergy. 
Their  greatest  work  for  the  thousand  years  preceding  the 
Reformation  period  was  to  bridge  the  chasm  between 
ancient  and  modern  thought,  to  preserve  and  transmit 
through  monasticism  the  ancient  authors,  "sacred  and  pro- 
fane", who  now  survive. 

Yet  even  before  the  granaries  of  literature  in  Constanti- 
nople had  been  sown  broadcast  over  the  world,  a  little  of 
the  seed  of  thought  had  been  scattered  here  and  there  and 
gave  promise  of  a  harvest :  and  it  can  hardly  be  doubted  that 
if  Constantinople  had  not  fallen  (1453)  as  it  did,  the  revival 
of  letters  and  consequent  religious  reformation  would  have 
taken  place.  But  the  permanent  results  of  all  this  intellec- 
tual advantage  had  not  been  secured  but  for  the  reformation 
in  moral  and  religious  conceptions.  The  "Revival  of 
Learning"  woulrl  in  all  probability  have  terminated  in  the 
patronage  of  princes  and  in  homage  to  genius  and  taste. 
There  were  real  indications  of  a  coming  fruitage  from  the 
growth,  ripening,  and  seed  sowing  of  such  minds  as  Wiclif, 
Dante,  Petrarch  and  Boccacio. 

THE   REFORMATION    IDEA 

Before  the  Reformation,  men's  minds  were  liound.  The 
Reformation  was  a  process  of  partial  unbinding  from  the 
restraints  of  the  hierarchy  of  the  Church  and  from  many 
of  the  superstitions  of  men's  own  minds.  When  men  felt 
free  they  thought ;  when  they  thought  they  stirred  up  others 
to  think.  Thouf/h  llic  Reformation  benan  ostensibly  in  an 
atlrwpt  to  substitute  Bible  authority  for  pope,  yet  its  essen- 
tial principle  was  freedom  of  mind;  llic  riglil  iind  dttty,  by 


5S      A    Kl'XElVEKSlllP    lUR    CIVILIZATION 

and  1)\,  for  each  man  to  think  for  himself.  Against  the 
rcsuUs  of  this,  Cathohc  writers  loudly  inveigh.  Fletcher, 
Alzog,  McOuaid,  Cajicl,  and  others  ascribe  to  the  principles 
of  the  Reformation  all  the  atheism  and  intidelily  of  modern 
Europe  and  America.     Grimke  replies  to  this: 

"Grant  it,  and  so  we  may  say,  without  Christianity  the 
countless  heresies  of  the  primitive  Church  would  never  have 
existed;  without  the  lil)crty  of  the  press,  its  licentiousness 
would  be  unknown :" 

"Nor  can  11u\v 
Be  free  to  keep  the  patli  wlio  arc  not  free  to  stray." 

But  they  have  not  strayed.  TJic  intelligent  mind  of  today 
now  sees  that  the  Church's  condemnation  of  Spinoza,  Bruno, 
Mojifaii/nc,  Voltaire,  Paine,  etc.,  as  "atheists"  and  "infidels" 
was  but  the  snarling  of  bigotry  resisting  the  efforts  of  the 
men  of  real  faith,  who  were  only  attempting  to  disturb  its 
lethargy  and  make  uncomfortable  its  vice. 

In  ancient  Egypt  the  artists  were  limited,  by  the  laws  of 
religion,  in  the  colors  that  they  might  use,  and  as  a  result 
painting  never  reached  excellence,  but  remained  coarse  and 
unrefined.  In  like  manner,  before  the  sixteenth  century, 
there  were  multitudes  of  abuses  adverse  to  the  improvement 
of  society.  The  Reformation  did  much  to  remove  these  and 
inspire  the  minds  of  men  with  new  activity.  In  the  north 
of  Europe  it  called  forth  the  powers  of  humanity,  while  in 
the  south,  the  Reformation  not  having  taken  root,  the 
Renaissance  spirit  was  arrested  and  the  promised  glory  of 
Italy  and  Spain  was  smothered.  In  those  countries  the 
greater  dread  of  adopting  Protest  ideas  permitted  the  gov- 
ernment to  pass  more  completely  into  the  hands  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  clergy,  and  they,  being  armed  with  the 
power,  grew  more  jealous  and  intolerant.  In  the  times 
just  preceding  and  during  the  Reformation,  there  breathed 
a  spirit  of  life  and  progression  in  Italy  and  Spain  which 
subserviency  and  long  degeneracy  have  rendered  their  people 
today  apparently  incompetent  to  repeat,  even  if  it  should  be 
tolerated. 


THE  NEXT  GREAT  PROTEST       59 

Such  a  spirit  of  practical  and  speculative  investigation 
had  never  before  prevailed  in  the  world.  Ancient  inquiry 
was  generally  theoretical  and  speculative  and  employed  only 
a  very  limited  part  of  the  community.  It  had  its  "Augustan 
age,"  extending  perhaps  from  Thales  to  Seneca;  but  it  per- 
ished, leaving  little  that  tended  to  the  substantial  improve- 
ment of  the  people.  The  speculation  resulting  from  the 
Reformation  has  taken  a  wonderfully  practical  turn. 
Through  this  the  modern  world  has  come  "to  live  and  move 
and  have  its  being." 

EFFECT    OF    THE    PROTEST    ON    PHILOSOPHY 

The  general  awakening  could  not  do  otherwise  than 
arouse  the  speculative  or  philosophical  spirit  and  give  it  new 
form  and  being.  Probably  the  man  first  impressed  with  the 
need  of  an  improvement  in  philosophy  was  Mclancthon, 
whose  name  we  justl}-  place  second  in  rcformai'wnal  honors. 
He  says,  "I  desire  a  sound  philosophy,  not  those  empty 
words  to  which  nothing  real  corresponds."  Philosophy  was 
then  and  is  yet  an  iiulefmite  something  after  which  men 
strive,  vainly  hoping  for  some  agreement.  The  reformers 
broke  the  chains  of  authority  and  thus  allowed  themselves 
and  others  to  speculate  freel\'  concerning  God,  his  works, 
and  their  relations.  They  reversed  the  doctrine  of  Ansehn, 
which  was,  "Not  to  understand  that  I  may  believe,  but  to 
believe  that  I  may  understand."  They  would  understand 
before  they  believed.  They  started  the  tendency  to  examine 
the  facts  and  then  derive  a  theory,  as  opposed  to  the  old 
method  of  being  previously  committed  to  a  theory  and  then 
reading  its  proof  from  the  facts,  whether  the  facts  sustained 
it  or  not.  As  someone  has  tersely  said,  "If  the  facts  were 
voi  in  accordance,  then  so  much  the  worse  for  the  facts." 
Men  tried  to  think  in  the  Middle  Ages  and  spent  much  time 
in  intellectual  gymnastics;  but  that  curse  of  all  the  ages, 
the  ban  of  heresy,  confined  all  mental  exertion  within  the 
limits  marked  out  by  the  Church.  Hence  the  world  is  dis- 
graced by  the  spectacle  of  all  Christendom  engaged  in  the 
prattle  of  children  for  a  thousand  years. 


6o      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

A  little  later  the  legitimate  result  of  this  mental  emanci- 
pation was  the  development  of  that  highest  of  speculative 
philosophical  sciences,  Natural  Theology,  an  undreamed-of 
idea  in  pre-reformational  Christendom.  The  seed  planted 
by  the  reformers,  having  its  germ  in  Melanctlion's  work  on 
Physics,  has  produced  abundant  fruit  in  the  works  of  later 
thinkers.  Following  naturally  in  the  train  of  this  more 
excellent  method  of  theological  conceptions,  came  a  better 
philosophy  of  human  life.  Inquiring  into  the  nature  of 
man,  vv^e  have  more  nearly  ascertained  his  needs  and  how  to 
meet  them.  With  latitude  for  the  work  of  the  ancients,  il 
may  be  said  that  modern  moral  philosophy  dates  from  the 
Reformation.  Here,  too,  Melancthon  paved  the  way  in  his 
"Elements  of  Ethics"  in  1550.  He  forsook  Aristotle,  and 
tried  to  refute  Epicurus  and  the  Stoics.  Although  he  could 
not  get  beyond  biblical  authorty,  he  yet  defined  virtue  more 
liberally  to  be  "obedience  of  the  will  to  such  rules  of  action 
as  are  in  practical  accordance  with  the  command  of  God." 
This  was  not  much  advance,  but  it  was  much  for  churchmen. 

Until  very  recently  it  may  be  truly  said,  that  no  branch 
of  science  has  been  cultivated  with  so  much  eagerness  and 
success,  by  German,  French,  and  English  thinkers,  as  the 
application  of  philosophy  to  morality.  How  encouraging 
the  change !  How  vastly  more  important  to  determine,  first, 
what  virtue  and  duty  are,  before  ascertaining  the  number 
of  angels  that  can  stand  upon  the  point  of  a  needle,  whether 
God  could  cause  himself  to  die,  or  whether  Christ  could 
have  appeared  as  a  squash!  If  the  scholastic  philosophers 
reasoned  of  rights  at  all,  it  was  always  the  rights  of  the  poor, 
downtrodden  and  abused  (?)  pope  and  clergy,  never  those 
of  the  people.  And  so  with  indomitable  perseverance  and 
dialectic  quibbling,  as  silly  as  persistent,  they  whiled  away 
the  centuries. 

The  new  spirit  drew  from  the  monastic  archives  the 
manuscripts  of  Aristotle  coated  with  the  dust  of  centuries. 
Up  to  this  time,  the  monkish  logicians  thought  their  systems 
were  founded  upon  his.  It  had  never  occurred  to  any  of 
them  in  two  score  generations  that  there  might  be  an  advan- 


THE  NEXT  GREAT  PROTEST       6i 

tage  in  each  studying  him  for  himself.  Aroused  by  the  new 
spirit,  men  took  down  the  books  and  examined  them.  This 
revealed  to  a  deluded  world  the  fact  that  the  revered  system 
of  the  schoolman  had  scarcely  any  resemblance  to  that  of 
the  "Stagirite."  (Aristotle  was  discovered  about  iioo.  A 
Latin  translation  of  his  works  was  made  by  the  Arabian 
Averroes  in  that  year.  First  Greek  edition,  1495.)  By 
centuries  of  devotion  to  the  idea  of  a  political  church  which 
was  infallible  in  its  own  eyes,  the  Christian  world  had  been 
gradually  lulled  into  intellectual  stupor.  At  the  time  of 
which  we  are  speaking,  this  had  resulted  very  nearly  in 
spiritual  death.  The  new  infusion  of  a  more  healthful 
method  of  looking  at  things  brought  with  it  a  new  spiritual 
life  to  the  many  who  embraced  it.  The  appetite  of  reason 
was  afterwards  treated  with  the  newly  discovered  philoso- 
phies of  Pythagoras,  Plato,  Seneca,  Marcus  Aurelius,  and 
the  rest  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  thinkers.  The  diet  and 
atmosphere  proved  so  healthful  that  an  age  of  philosophers 
—  doubters,  speculators,  reasoners — followed.  Thus  the  race 
is  blessed  w^th  the  more  independent  lives  of  Bacon,  Des- 
cartes, Hobbes,  Grotius,  Spinoza,  Gassendi,  Pascal,  Male- 
branche,  Locke,  Leibnitz,  Wolf,  Bayle,  Berkeley,  Hume, 
Kant,  Hegel,  Lotze,  Spencer,  etc. 

EFFECT  OF  THE  PROTEST  ON   EDUCATION 

Previous  to  the  time  of  the  Reformation  men  seldom  had 
the  courage  to  look  a  new  truth  in  the  face.  Freely  specula- 
tive thought  was  not  compatible  with  the  immutable 
])rinci[)]es  of  traditional  scholastic  theology.  The  credulity 
of  men  had  reached  a  climax  in  the  belief  of  the  teachings 
of  priestcraft,  and  thus,  from  accumulated  incapacity 
through  silly  faith  and  under  mortal  fear  lest  it  should  tread 
on  holy  ground,  the  mind  of  man  remained  almost  stationary 
for  ages.  Proscription,  then  as  now,  was  fatal  to  all  free 
and  manly  exertion.  Ecclesiasticism  has  always  and  every- 
where been  a  dominating  power,  and  when  strong  enough 
this  spirit  makes  an  abject  slave  of  mind. 


62      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Bui  ivith  the  Reformation  begins  a  nciv  era  in  the  educa- 
tional history  of  Europe.  In  fact  it  is  the  great  era  in  the 
history  of  education.  The  best  works  of  antiquity  being 
unearthed,  the  problems  which  moved  the  ancient  mind  now 
moved  the  modern.  Hitherto  men  had  been  led  by  authority, 
now  it  beamed  upon  them  that  a  man's  individual  judg- 
ment determined  the  responsibility  of  his  faith  and  practice. 
P  became,  therefore,  a  matter  of  great  moment,  that  these 
convictions  of  individual  judgment  should  be  rightly  and 
wisely  formed.  Hence,  if  all  ivere  to  exercise  their  private 
judgments,  all  must  be  educated  to  the  capacity  of  an  intelli- 
gent exercise  of  them;  i.  e.,  if  universal  exercise  of  judg- 
ment, then  universal  education.  Without  this  the  Reforma- 
tion was  seen  to  be  a  gigantic  blunder.  This  was  indeed 
one  real  difference  between  the  traditional  view  of  the 
Church  and  that  of  Protestantism. 

But  reformers  generally  are  liable  to  fail  in  discerning 
the  effects  of  their  measures  on  the  minds  of  those  less 
informed  and  less  imbued  with  their  spirit  than  they. 
Almost  every  person  is  a  would-be  reformer  to  the 
views  v.'hich  he  holds.  Yet  each  forgets  to  thoroughly 
extend  in  thought  his  theory  as  it  would  seem  in  general 
practice.  Perhaps  this  was  well  in  the  case  of  the  early 
reformers.  Foresight  of  the  result  of  their  efforts  would 
probably  have  been  at  the  expense  of  courage  to  undertake. 
Thu.s,  theoretically,  there  was  opened  up  the  notion  of  a 
possible  and  a  necessary  universal  education.  Every  effort 
for  this  end  put  forth  in  modern  times  finds  its  beginning 
here.  Luther  proclaimed  that  the  education  of  the  people 
was  a  crying  want  of  his  day,  and  he  wrote  letters  to  the 
various  town  authorities  urging  attention  to  this  necessity. 
In  England  the  same  object  was  earnestly  labored  for. 
Many  bequests  were  made.  So  in  Scotland  we  have  the 
efforts  of  John  Knox  and  his  coadjutors  to  establish 
parochial  schools  and  churches  in  every  parish  in  the 
kingdom.  In  Germany  during  the  last  three  centuries  more 
than  twenty  universities  have  been  founded,  three- fourths 
of  which  are  Protestant.     Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the 


THE  NEXT  GREAT  PROTEST       63 

Catholic  population  is  double  the  Protestant  in  Germandom 
(including  Austria),  yet  there  were  some  years  ago  nineteen 
Protestant  universities  and  only  seventeen  Catholic.  Such 
facts  show  that  the  Protestants  realize  that  the  very 
existence  of  their  "ism"  depends  on  their  being  the  best 
informed.  But  how  was  this  unforeseen  and  prodigious 
necessity  to  be  brought  about — of  making  every  class  from 
royalty  to  lowest  peasantry  capable  of  a  judgment  of  its 
own?  The  question  is  still  waiting  for  a  full  answer  after 
four  hundred  years  of  effort.  But  answer  there  must  be; 
the  security,  comfort,  and  development  of  the  race  depend 
upon  it. 

Education  is  now  believed  to  be  a  question  of  national 
policy,  a  necessity  to  the  people,  and  the  business  of  every 
individual.  For  a  long  time  naturally,  on  account  of  the 
revival  of  antiquity,  antiquity  was  supposed  to  furnish  the 
anstver.  But  finally,  that  spirit  of  inquiry  which  has  over- 
stepped the  bounds  of  authority,  had  also  re-explored  (as 
was  supposed)  the  whole  field  of  ancient  research.  Then  it 
spread  into  the  fields  of  original  investigation.  The  gram- 
mar, logic,  and  rhetoric  of  Galen,  Celsus,  and  Aristotle  no 
longer  gave  satisfaction.  Comenius,  Bacon,  .Sturm,  Eocke, 
Milton,  and  others  changed  the  methods  of  teaching  and 
laid  the  foundation  of  a  better  system  of  education. 
Emulating  their  example,  Fenelon,  EaChatolais,  Schlaezer, 
Pestalozzi,  Froebel,  .Spencer,  Horace  Mann,  Montessori,  and 
many  others  have  given  us  our  modern  educational  theories. 
The  world  has  gotten  into  the  habit  of  consulting  the  Book 
cjf  Nature  in  preference  to  the  Decretals  of  the  Church  and 
the  classics  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  Languages.  //  Grimke's 
statement  made  in  1S2J  was  true  then,  it  is  twice  true  now: 

"More  has  been  done  in  three  centuries  by  the  Protestants, 
in  the  profound,  comprehensive,  exact,  rational,  and  liberal 
development,  culture,  and  application  of  every  department 
of  knowlerlge,  both  theoretical  and  practical,  with  a  view  to 
public  and  private  improvement,  than  has  been  done  by  all 
the  rest  of  the  world,  both  ancient  and  modern,  since  the 
days  of  Lycurgus." 


CHAPTER  IV 

PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  ESSENCE  AND 
LIMITATIONS 

Protestantism  historically  includes  all  those  religious 
denominations  outside  of  Roman  and  Greek  Catholicism 
who  follow  more  or  less  the  line  of  traditional,  authoritative, 
or  doctrinal  Christianity.  It  is  said  to  include  upwards  of 
three  hundred  sects,  more  than  one  hundred  and  forty  of 
whom  are  represented  in  the  United  States.  All  use  the 
Bible  as  chief  authority.  In  the  Greek  and  Roman  Catholic 
churches  the  Hierarchy  and  its  Council  Canons  are  supreme. 

ITS  SIGNIFICANCE  AT  FIRST 

Protestantism  at  its  start  was  simply  the  protest  of  Martin 
Luther  and  a  few  of  his  compeers  against  certain  abuses  in 
the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  The  special  occasion  of  this 
outbreak  was  but  one  of  a  hundred  incidents,  viz.,  the 
preaching  of  a  papal  nuncio,  named  Tetzel,  through 
Germany  in  the  year  1517.  The  Pope,  Leo  X,  was  trying 
to  raise  money  to  build  a  great  St.  Peter's  Cathedral  at 
Rome.  One  of  the  methods  was  the  open  shameless  sale  of 
"indulgences."  This  was  especially  hateful  to  some  of  the 
less  corrupted  Teutonic  or  Northern  minds.  Martin  Luther 
led  in  opposing  it.  According  to  the  custom  then  prevalent 
he  nailed  upon  the  church  door  at  Wittenberg  his  accusation 
against  church  practices  and  doctrines.  There  were  ninety- 
five  theses,  and  these  he  proposed  to  defend  publicly  against 
Tetzel  and  all  other  comers. 

As  may  be  imagined,  the  excitement  was  great,  because 
the  action  was  at  bottom  the  calling  in  question  of  papal 

64 


PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  LIMITATIONS       65 

authority.  Three  years  later,  1520,  it  was  seen  by  the 
church  authorities  that  there  was  a  serious,  wide-spread 
rupture,  and  Luther  was  excommunicated.  It  was  thought 
that  this  would  end  the  matter  by  relegating  the  factious 
monk  to  obscurity.  The}-  were  mistaken.  The  now  more 
enraged  reformer  held  a  great  meeting  in  a  public  square 
at  Wittenburg,  made  a  fiery  denunciatory  speech,  and  openly 
burned  the  papal  Bull  of  Excommunication.  This  was  the 
most  audacious  act  that  had  occurred  in  Christendom  for  a 
thousand  years.  As  the  result  proved,  the  times  were  ripe 
for  a  great  movement.  Luther  had  hundreds  of  sympathiz- 
ers, and  their  moral  support  paved  the  way  for  his  further 
work. 

The  movement  thus  begun  became  known  as  Protestant- 
ism, that  is,  as  the  Istn  of  Protest-ants.  It  has  steadily 
increased.  Let  us  now  devote  a  little  thoughtful  attention 
to  an  analysis  of  its  meaning,  its  limitations,  its  excellencies, 
its  outcome.  In  making  i\\\>  survey,  let  us  not  do  it  by  the 
dim  twilight  of  ancient  thought  and  ideals,  but  by  the 
brighter  day  of  the  broader  twentieth  centur>'  science  and 
culture.  If  you  please  we  might  say  our  topic  is  Protestant- 
ism from  the  standpoint  of  Science  and  Critical  History. 

ITS  ESSENCE 

I.     Protestantism  zvas  a  break  with  the  Catholic  Church. 

It  was  more  of  a  break  than  even  the  courageous  Luther 
realized.  It  was  a  thing  of  great  significance  in  the  history 
of  the  world.  Erasmus,  the  greatest  literary  scholar  of  that 
day,  could  not  have  made  this  break,  for  he  believed  that 
"peaceful  error  was  better  than  tempestuous  truth."  He 
was  a  sample  of  those  who  in  all  time  lack  the  courage  of 
their  convictions.  They  fear  to  break  with  authority. 
They  make  loyalty  to  conviction  subordinate  to  loyalty  to 
(lead  men.  Such  people  can  never  be  ref(jrmers.  With  the 
real  reformer,  if  the  past  does  not  harmonize  with  his  con- 
victions, so  much  the  worse  for  the  jiast.  His  determination 
requires   a   courage   that  exceeds   all   other  kinds.     To  go 


60      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

alone  toward  the  new  ideal  is  more  perilous  to  most  men 
than  going  to  deadly  battle  accompanied  by  the  hosts  of 
one's  nation.  The  Present  never  approves  the  reformer's 
act ;  but  the  Future  gives  him  double  praise.  The  growing 
ranks  of  truer  Protestants  will  never  cease  to  laud  the 
\\  ittenburg  monk  who  dared  carry  forth  the  movement  for 
religious  liberty. 

2.  Protestantism  was  an  attempt  to  transfer  goodness 
from  external  formality  to  internal  actuality. 

In  Catholicism,  goodness  had  crystalized  into  formalism, 
thoughtless  ceremonialism.  "Justification  by  faith,"  which 
was  the  watchword  of  the  Lutheran  Reformation,  meant 
that  inward  attitude  alone  determines  the  worth.  "In  the 
sight  of  God,"  said  Luther.  Protestantism  insisted  on  more 
of  the  inward,  and  less  of  the  outward ;  more  of  the  personal 
and  less  of  the  formal ;  more  of  the  substance,  less  of  show. 

3.  Protestantism  demanded  freedom  for  conscience. 

Luther  said  at  Worms :  "It  is  not  safe  nor  right  to  do 
anything  against  conscience;  I  cannot  do  otherwise;  here  I 
stand ;  God  help  me.  Amen." 

Out  of  this  principle  have  grown  all  the  various  sects 
within  its  borders.  Out  of  this  principle  has  grown  what- 
ever liberty  now  exists  in  Protestant  lands.  Puritanism  w^as 
a  revolt  on  conscientious  scruples  against  the  laxness  and 
formalism  of  the  seventeenth  century  English  Church. 
Unitarianism  in  England  and  America  was  a  revolt  of 
reason  and  conscience  against  the  dogmas  of  orthodox 
Protestantism.  That  revolt  is  still  widening.  Within  the 
specifically  Protestant  circles  there  are  today  tens  of  thou- 
sands of  protests  in  the  name  of  conscience  and  reason 
against  dogmas  and  doctrines  imported  from  Ancient, 
Middle  Age,  and  Early  Modern  times.  And  the  reason  for 
these  protests  is  a  doubt  that  Protestantism  is  living  up  to 
its  fundamental  principles.  Has  it  been  and  is  it  yet  fully 
consistent  with  this,  its  foundation  doctrine?  Even  Luther 
persecuted  Karlstadt,  Calvin  burned  Servetus,  the  Puritans 


PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  LIMITATIONS        67 

banished  Roger  Williams,  and  numerous  Protestant  bodies 
are  even  today  occasionally  busy  with  heresy  trials  and 
expulsions.  For  lack  of  this  consistency,  Protestantism 
collectively  scathes  the  new  movements  outside  of  itself, 
although  they  are  based  on  the  same  principle  which  caused 
its  existence,  and  although  they  are  undertaken  for  the 
accomplishment  of  the  very  work  it  has  failed  to  do. 

4.  Protestantism  is  essentially  and  ultimately  destructive 
of  all  isms. 

By  this  principle  of  freedom,  which  is  its  very  nature,  it 
started  and  is  accomplishing  the  disintegration  of  itself  as 
a  distinct  church  tendency;  yes,  even  the  disintegration  of 
all  orthodox  or  standard  types  of  Christianity  (and  even 
political  authority).  Through  the  spread  of  this  principle, 
the  old  religious  conceptions  are  gradually  dissolving  and 
passing  away.  Not  all  the  censures  of  all  the  Voltaires  and 
Thomas  Paines  and  Robert  Ingersolls  have  so  much  aided 
in  this  work,  as  the  very  spirit  of  Protestant  freedom 
blossoming  today  in  Science  and  Historical  Criticism.  Men 
who  have  never  read  these  authors  or  such  as  these,  who 
never  hear  "liberal"  sermons  or  lectures,  are  looking  at  the 
world  in  a  different  way.  The  very  atmosphere  today  seems 
to  be  full  of  an  inspiration  toward  such  freedom.  Gradu- 
ally, silently,  easily,  are  the  old  views  of  miracle,  the  future, 
the  Bible,  prayer,  and  providence  dropping  away.  Men  do 
not  know  that  they  have  lost  them. 

The  difference  between  men  of  culture  in  and  out  of  the 
Church  is  becoming  beautifully  less.  The  difference 
between  people  of  different  denominations  is  largely  a  dif- 
ference of  birth,  tradition,  temperament,  and  culture. 
Religion  has  come  to  be  "a.  reverence  for  goodness  and  a 
confidence  that  the  universe  is  on  that  side"^ — though  it  is 
to  many  yet  disguised  by  numerous  pious  names  and  phrases. 
Only  the  zealot  or  antiquarian  is  still  very  much  interested 
in  denominational  differences.  By  degrees  the  principle  of 
independent,  honest  freedom  of  thought,  the  conscientious 
reliance  of  the  mind  on  its  own  perceptions,  is  supplanting 


68      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

reliance  upon  church  authority  or  book  authority.  Already 
there  are  thousands  who  read  the  Bible  almost  as  honestly 
as  they  do  other  books.  The  true  Protestant  aspires  toward 
the  right  use  of  every  faculty,  and  believes  that  leaning 
either  upon  sacred  hierarchies  or  sacred  books  is  alike  de- 
structive to  the  iiighest  ends  of  living. 

Luther  and  other  reformers  from  the  ranks  of  Catholicism 
v.'ould  have  stood  aghast  at  these  consequences  of  their 
labors,  and  yet  the  relentless  logic  of  the  Protestantism 
which  they  inaugurated  is  fearlessly  giving  up  the  very  type 
of  religion  which  gave  it  birth.  I  mean  of  course  the 
religion  which  rests  upon  outward  authority.  Surely 
Christianity  must  be  said  to  exist  in  a  different  sense,  when 
Jesus  comes  to  be  example  and  inspiration  instead  of 
authority.  Humanity  is  ever  laying  off  its  old  forms  and 
institutions.  So  is  it  ever  all-too-slowly  laying  aside  its 
small  and  worn-out  ideas  of  former  days.  There  is  a  child- 
hood, a  youth,  and  a  manhood  both  for  the  individual  and  for 
the  race,  and  neither  the  earlier  clothes  of  the  one  nor  the 
culture  of  the  other  is  adapted  to  the  later  periods  of  either. 

5.  Protestantism  is  practically  doing  what  its  founders 
would  have  called  "giving  up  the  Bible." 

It  is  gradually  subjecting  the  book  to  reason.  It  is  giving 
it  up  as  an  unquestioned  authority.  To  the  common  people 
of  the  middle  ages  the  Bible  was  a  sealed  book.  The  priests 
claimed  it  as  an  indisputable  back-ground  for  their  assumed 
divine  authority.  The  Protestant  movement  brought  Jesus 
and  his  apostles  out  of-  their  vague  and  shadowy  position  as 
founders  and  pillars  of  the  ecclesiastical  empire,  and  set 
them  before  the  world  as  figures  in  the  common  history  of 
the  race.  In  early  Protestantism  they  were  not  wholly 
natural,  but  they  have  under  the  Protestant  principle  steadily 
grown  more  and  more  natural.  When  the  Bible  became  the 
property  of  the  common  people  its  subjects  began  to  be  seen, 
without  exaggeration — more  and  more  as  they  actually  were. 
Such  a  carrying-out  of  its  fundamental  principles  may  seem 
to  require  a  long  period;  but  the  result  is  sooner  or  later 


PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  LIMITATIONS        69 

inevitable.  This  ancient  sacred  literature  is  not  being 
thrown  aside;  it  is  being  seen  in  its  true  position.  It  is 
coming  to  its  true  and  grander  meaning.  The  world  is 
discovering  that  the  former  reverence  was  based  on  an 
ignorant  and  superstitious  understanding.  Because  of  this 
a  few  radicals  here  and  there,  under  the  spirit  of  reaction 
and  without  the  genuine  reform  attitude,  have  cast  it  aside 
indiscriminately. 

But  if  the  Bible  does  not  occupy  the  authoritative  sacro- 
central  position  of  former  days,  it  yet  has  a  conspicuous 
literary  and  historical  use  in  testifying  to  great  creative 
periods  in  the  religio-moral  history  of  a  most  influential  part 
of  the  human  race.  The  inspiring  utterances  and  lofty 
strains  of  those  grand  old  prophets  of  the  Jewish  Canon, 
the  parabolic,  mystic,  yet  earnest,  trusting  teaching  of  Jesus, 
the  fier\'  zeal  and  lofty  morality  of  Paul,  sprang  from  pro- 
found convictions  of  real  men  for  whom  religion  was  no 
shame  and  for  whom  life  was  the  accomplishment  of  right- 
eousness, and  to  one  who  can  distinguish  the  spirit  from 
the  letter,  to  one  who  can  discern  the  moral  and  religious 
gems  from  their  unintelligible  and  legendary  settings,  it  will 
ever  be  a  historic  landmark  of  true  moral  inspiration.  The 
righteousness  with  which  it  is  studded  gets  its  splendor  not 
from  the  assumption  that  it  was  the  tangibly  written-out  and 
handed-down  law  of  a  supermundane  being.  Nor  is  our 
confidence  in  the  triumph  of  righteousness  throughout  the 
world  increased  by  the  picturesque  dogma-threat  in  the 
form  of  future  judgment.  (For  further  expansion  of 
"The  Authority  of  Former  Times"  see  Part  Three). 

THE    I.TMITATIONS   OF   PROTESTANTISM 

I.  Protestantism  appealed  to  the  Bible  against  Catholi- 
cism . 

This  has  not  been  a  very  successful  weapon.  It  was  more 
consistent  than  the  as.sumption  of  Catholicism  ;  but  it  is  not 
wholly  consistent.  If  the  Bible  does  not  say  anything  about 
or  against  Council  or  Pope,  Purgatory  or  Intercession  of 


yo      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVIlJZA'nON 

Saints;  yet  it  proclaims  other  things  which  when  it  is  re- 
garded as  an  authority,  are  by  no  means  illogical  producers 
of  some  later  Catholic  doctrines.  What  reason  is  there,  in 
the  nature  of  things,  why,  if  one  man  could  speak  with 
authority  or  literally  forgive  sins,  he  should  not  have  dele- 
gated this  power  to  his  followers?  If  prayers  may  avail  for 
the  living,  why  not  for  the  dead?  And  especially  if  the 
prayers  of  the  righteous  here  have  power  at  the  "throne  of 
God,"  much  more  so  presumably  may  such  prayers  avail 
when  the  righteous  have  become  saints  in  Heaven.  These 
are  Catholic  doctrines  which  have  been  drawn  from  the 
Bible  by  the  logical  inference.  Protestantism  has  not  an- 
swered and  cannot  answer  them,  so  long  as  it  assumes 
biblical  authority.  Protestantism  itself  is  a  tissue  of  doc- 
trines which  do  not  have  incontrovertible  foundation,  even 
in  its  Bible  source. 

2.  Protestantism  attempted  to  make  the  Bible  man's 
continual  rule  of  faith  and  practice,  forgetting  that  the  world 
m.oves,  that  all  men  think,  and  that  the  world  of  Luther's 
and  our  day  is  separated  from  the  Bible  world  by  many 
centuries  of  time,  and,  what  is  more  important,  by  many 
centuries  of  thought  and  experience. 

We  cannot  think,  nor  believe,  nor  hope,  nor  live,  as  Bible 
writers  exhorted  and  commanded  in  their  times.  The  Bible 
stage  of  culture  has  been  superceded  by  a  higher,  though  the 
Bible  ideal  of  righteousness,  the  passionate  biblical  moral 
attitude,  is  of  perennial  importance.  Men  in  sympathy  with 
the  culture  of  our  age  can  find  little  solace  in  the  world 
outlook  which  they  read  in  the  New  Testament.  Law,  not 
miracle,  fills  men's  thought  today.  Nobody  with  a  moderate 
supply  of  twentieth  century  culture  can  read  these  ancient 
books,  using  his  natural  powers,  without  protesting  against 
many  things  therein  asserted  as  literal  facts.  Today  the 
cultured  man  is  hoping  for  an  increase  of  "righteousness 
on  earth."  He  expects  this  through  natural  means.  He  is 
not  looking  for  a  "kingdom  of  God"  brought  about  by  a 
power  out  of  the  clouds.     If  men  now  fancy  themselves 


PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  LIMITATIONS        71 

believers  of  literally  biblical  statements  and  Middle  Age 
doctrines  therefrom  drawn,  it  is  because  they  have  not 
really  read  with  open  eyes.  They  have  not  taken  the  pains 
to  put  those  statements  before  themselves  in  unvarnished 
naturalness.  They  have  not  examined  those  thoughts  in  the 
light  of  the  age  and  the  conditions  in  which  they  were 
written.  They  have  not  compared  their  claims  and  merits 
with  those  of  other  sacred  books  of  the  world.  They  have 
not  allowed  the  prevailing  natural  thought  of  their  own 
times  to  have  its  due  weight. 

3.  Protestantism  has  rejected  parts  of  the  old  faith 
without  adding  anything  new. 

Like  Catholicism,  it  imported  from  ancient  times  its 
world-outlook.  Its  improvement  was  a  rejection  of  certain 
degenerate  details  which  grew  up  in  degenerate  ages.  Of 
course  it  is  much  to  be  rid  of  numerous  and  gross  errors  of 
the  old  Church.  This  was  a  most  valuable  reform.  It  was 
indispensable  as  a  basis  for  further  reform;  still,  it  is  only 
a  small  part  of  the  vast  reform  yet  to  take  place.  But  this 
is  negative  work.  This  is  just  what  Protestantism  censures 
"radicals"  for.  Even  at  this  date,  Protestantism  has  scarcely 
reached  that  advanced  attitude  which  amounts  to  willingness 
to  have  its  faith  examined.  Nor  has  it  as  yet  evinced  a 
willingness  to  adopt  the  great  multitude  of  new  truths  which 
have  been  discovered  by  the  method  of  investigation  since 
Luther's  Reformation  began.  It  clings  with  an  unaccount- 
able tenacity  to  old  authority,  old  traditions,  old  doctrines. 
While  doing  this  it  cannot  renovate  its  faith  nor  can  it 
assimilate  the  new  ideas. 

Pres.  Dewitt  C.  Hyde,  D.  D.,  of  Bowdoin  College,  said : 
"The  Current  creed  of  Christendom  is  a  chaos  of  contra- 
dictions. Truths  and  lies,  facts  and  fancies,  institutions 
and  superstitions,  essentials  and  excrescences,  are  bound  in 
one  bundle  of  traditions,  which  the  honest  believer  finds 
hard  to  swallow  whole,  and  which  the  earnest  doubter  is 
equally  reluctant  to  in  toto  reject.  It  is  high  time  to  attack 
this  chaos,  to  resolve  it  into  its  elements,  and  to  reorganize 


yz      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

our  faith  into  n  form  which  shall  at  the  same  time  command 
the  assent  of  honest  and  the  devotion  of  earnest  men." 

Do  the  crying  needs  of  life  and  society  receive  sympa- 
thetic answer  from  Protestantism  as  a  body?  Does  it  have 
a  new  idea  of  life  and  society.  Does  it  see  the  fact  that 
the  old  ideas  are  worn  out?  Does  it  perceive  the  vast 
changes  that  have  come  over  the  world  through  the  liberty 
which  was  gained  by  the  first  protesting  rebellion  and  by 
the  numerous  inventions,  discoveries,  and  demonstrations 
which  have  resulted  from  the  partial  employment  of  the 
Protestant  principle?  Organized  Protestantism  denies  and 
denounces  the  most  thorough-going  adherents  of  the  prin- 
ciple of  Protestantism.  It  does  not  see  that  the  great  scien- 
tific discoveries,  the  great  political  and  religious  agitators 
are  "Protestants"  of  the  first  rank.  Instead  of  rejecting 
and  disowning  these  for  four  centuries,  should  it  not  have 
espoused  them  and  given  them  the  first  place  in  its  history 
and  upon  its  rolls  of  honor? 

Not  the  Bible,  not  logically  nice  exegetical  explanations 
of  the  Bible,  not  revisions  of  the  Bible,  not  a  deeper  under- 
standing of  the  Bible,  not  even  a  truer  estimate  of  the  life 
and  work  of  Jesus  himself,  not  one  nor  all  of  these  is  the 
crushing  need  of  the  world;  but  a  conception  of  truth  and 
social  righteousness  based  on  the  new  understanding  of  the 
Fountain  of  Nature.  Not  Church,  nor  priests,  nor  prayers, 
nor  holy  books,  but  a  religion  of  justice  and  larger  hope. 
That  which  the  world  calls  Protestantism,  as  such,  is  not 
leading  in  developing  these.  Like  its  parent,  Catholicism, 
it  quietly  and  contentedly  accepts  and  settles  down  into  the 
forms,  practices,  and  doctrines  of  society  which  it  finds,  and 
it  neither  feels  nor  exerts  much  impulse  toward  reorganiza- 
tion. Like  the  Old  Faith,  it  is  yet  busy  with  other-world 
affairs.  The  fundamental  premises  of  its  creed  are  a  con- 
demnation of  this  world.  It  has  accepted  as  ultimate  truth 
the  opinions  of  thinkers  who  lived  eighteen  centuries  or 
more  ago.  These  men  condemned  this  life  and  devised 
great  systems  as  to  how  a  better  state  in  some  other  was  to 
be    attained.     Those    thinkers    through    various    influences 


PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  LIMITATIONS        73 

have  become  authority  for  most  of  the  Western  World ; 
hence,  as  they  think  this  life  is  short,  and  the  next  long;  as 
sin  entered  ineradicably  into  the  race  in  the  beginning;  as 
man's  true  life  is  not  attainable  in  the  mundane  sphere;  it 
is  scarcely  worth  while  to  waste  time  and  effort  in  the 
fruitless  task  of  undertaking  ideal  reforms  here. 

4.  Protestantism  keeps  trying  to  get  back  to  Jesus  and 
Paul. 

In  those  few  cases  where  notions  of  needed  and  possible 
reform  in  religious  and  social  doctrine  and  life  have  sprung 
up  within  Protestant  organizations,  they  have  been  based 
on  the  supposition  that  a  return  to  the  primitive  pure  teach- 
ing of  Christianity  was  all  that  was  needed  to  accomplish  the 
reform  of  the  World.  Hence  the  modern  effort  in  exegeti- 
cal  historical  research.  To  state  the  same  fact  in  another 
way,  it  is  probably  yet  believed  by  most  of  the  Christian 
Church  that  an  absolutely  perfect  moral  and  religious  theory 
and  ideal  were  developed  more  than  eighteen  centuries  ago, 
and  that  all  attempts  of  thinkers  of  the  more  advanced  and 
enlightened  later  ages  have  not  and  cannot  improve  the 
system  then  proposed!  If  this  were  not  so  pathetic  in  its 
world-wide  degrading  consequences,  it  would  be  ludicrous 
beyond  words.  IVho  could  do  justice  to  the  spectacle  of 
the  vast  Protestant  organization  which  assumes  for  itself 
the  office  of  giving  the  most  uplifting  ideals  to  mankind, 
and  yet  which  persistently  stands  with  its  hack  to  the  future, 
and  takes  from  the  hands  of  the  remote  past  whatever  ideas 
it  possesses,  all  forgetful  of  the  crystal  fountains  within  the 
minds  of  men,  living  in  this  hundred  times  more  enlightened 
age! 

But  where  did  this  greater  enlightenment  come  from? 
Wher/ce  arose  these  grander  ideas  which  have  outstripped 
the  older  Protestantism?  The  answer  is  easy.  They  came 
from  the  newer  and  truer  Protestants.  We  owe  them  to 
those  who  have  more  con.sistently  lived  out  the  early  Protest- 


74      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

ant  principle.     Our  supreme  (jratitude  is  due  to  those  whom 
crxstaliccd  Protestaniisin  continually  ignores  and  disowns* 

THE  FINAL  OUTCOME 

if  this  analysis  of  the  nature  and  limitations  of  Protest- 
antism is  nearly  correct,  it  is  only  necessary  to  gather  up 
the  substance  of  it  to  realize  the  final  outcome  of  the  break. 
Protestantism  has  been  one  of  the  greatest  changes  in  human 
history.  It  has  proven  far  greater  than  its  earlier  projectors 
anticipated.  It  is  difficult  to  give  due  weight  to  its  tremen- 
dous influence. 

It  was  a  protest  against  church  authority  and  in  favor  of 
individual  liberty.  It  demanded  freedom  for  conscience  and 
thus  virtually,  though  unintentionally,  demanded  freedom 
for  thought.  This  was  not  the  purpose  of  the  great  re- 
formers. They  tied  the  human  mind  up  again  to  a  more 
remote  authority.  They  appealed  from  Church  to  Bible, 
from  Pope  to  Jesus.  This  was  illogical.  Their  right  to 
this  much  of  protest  was  based  on  the  right  to  more.  It 
was  a  right  which  they  knew  not  of  and  did  not  desire. 
They  did  not  know  the  nature  of  the  freedom,  and  had  never 
dreamed  of  being  wholly  free-men.  The  Protestantism 
which  they  began  is  in  its  essence  destructive  to  every  dog- 
matic and  fixed  ism.  Looked  at  in  a  large  way,  it  was^  a 
great  break  of  the  human  mind  for  liberty.  The  break  with 
one  authority  meant  ultimately  the  break  with  all  authorities, 
as  such.  It  meant  that  henceforeward  less  and  less  should 
authority  be  taken  for  truth.  It  meant  that  increasingly 
more  and  more  truth  should  be  the  only  authority.  It  was 
the  modern  beginning  of  the  grand  movement  for  universal 
freedom  in  thought,  in  conscience,  and  in  religion. 

Protestantism,  in  fine,  is  yet  but  half  fledged.  When  it 
is  full  grown,  it  will  have  surpassed  itself  as  an  ism  in  the 
old  sense.     When  it  has  done  its  work,  the  age  of  freedom 


*  See  further  Chapters  VIII  and  XVII  to  XIX.  See  also  the 
coming  "Landmarks  of  Science  from  Columbus  to  Spencer"  by 
Duren  J.  H.  Ward. 


PROTESTANT-ISM— ITS  LIMITATIONS        75 

will  have  arrived.  There  is  no  stopping  place.  If  we  are 
true  Protestants  we  shall  ever  protest  against  every  infring- 
ment  upon  reason.  We  shall  do  this  in  ever  nobler  manner. 
We  shall  ignore  every  priestly  and  political  demand  that 
rests  on  a  reasonless  faith.  We  shall  smile  at  the  demands 
of  authority  when  they  are  based  on  credulity.  The  claim 
of  a  complete  freedom  is  an  increasing  attitude  in  the  human 
mind.  There  is  gradually  evolving  in  us  an  intelligence 
which  sees  its  rights.  This  shall  never  rest  until  that  free- 
dom is  reached  and  until  the  privileges  which  it  affords  are 
universally  conceded. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  PROTEST  MOVEMENT,  A  NORTHERN  RACE 

AWAKENING 

EFFECT  ON  THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  PHYSICAL  SCIENCE 

In  recalling  the  intellectual  consequences  of  this  great 
historical  movement,  we  naturally  come  next  to  that  most 
wonderful  of  all  developments,  Modern  Physical  Science. 
At  the  beginning  of  its  unshackling  from  tradition,  the  mind 
of  man  tended  toward  the  speculative  treatment  of  all  prob- 
lems. This  is  the  order  even  in  the  development  of  a  single 
individual.  Some  practice  in  speculative  and  reasoning 
power  is  necessary  before  man  can  discern  through  investi- 
gation the  physical  forces  of  nature  and  turn  them  to  his 
advantage.  Since  man  has  acquired  the  knack  of  investi- 
gating and  reasoning  on  the  basis  of  facts,  his  successes 
have  been  a  constant  source  of  surprise,  delight,  and  added 
comfort.  As  we  look  about  our  homes  and  land,  we  see 
them  crowded  with  articles  of  convenience,  scarcely  any  of 
which,  in  their  present  perfection  at  least,  antedate  the 
Reformation.  These  are  but  the  tangible  results  of  our 
systematic  investigative  thought  which  we  call  Science. 

The  Science  of  the  ancients  ends  with  theory;  the  Science 
of  our  age  has  only  begun  when  it  has  theory.  The  modern 
mind  insists  on  verification  and  reduction  to  practice.  This 
reverence  for  fact  and  the  prevailing  trust  in  the  universality 
of  natural  laws  have  wrought  and  are  working  wonders  in 
Physical  .Science.  It  would  require  nothing  less  than  a 
library  to  describe  the  post-reformational  improvements  in 
Physics,  Chemistry,  Biology,  Astronomy,   History,  and  in 

76 


THE  PROTEST  MOVEMENT  -jj 

Agriculture,  Mechanical  and  Fine  Arts.  Since  Luther 
nailed  his  theses  to  the  church  door  at  Wittenberg,  how 
changed  has  been  the  life  of  the  world!  Societies  for  the 
advancement  of  all  that  pertains  to  the  material  welfare  of 
man  have  been  organized  in  ever}-  part  of  the  globe  where 
the  reformational  ideas  could  work.  Such  gatherings  as 
the  Royal  Society  of  England,  the  French  Academy  of 
Sciences,  the  German  Royal  Scientific  Society  and  various 
Academies  of  Anthropology,  the  British  and  the  American 
Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science,  and  multitudes 
more  of  similar  character,  would  have  been  impossible 
before  on  account  of  popish  interference,  even  if  other  cir- 
cumstances had  made  them  possible.  Again  and  again  has 
this  statement  been  proved  by  the  attitude  of  the  Church 
of  Rome  toward  the  advances  which  have  been  made  where 
it  has  had  more  or  less  power  of  interference.  It  seems 
almost  as  though  it  had  set  its  face  resolutely  against  en- 
lightenment and  was  determined  that  the  people  should 
remain  in  ignorance.  The  shout  of  "infidel,  atheist,  enemy 
of  God"  has  been  raised  against  every  man  who  dared  to 
publish  to  the  world  the  results  of  his  most  careful  investi- 
gations. So  it  was  with  the  earlier  conclusions  of  Science, 
and  so  it  continues  to  be  even  now.  When  Galileo  with  his 
newly  invented  telescope  discovered  the  moons  of  Jupiter, 
he  was  told  by  the  priests  that  it  was  impossible,  because 
there  were  only  seven  openings  to  a  man's  head !  What 
connection  this  has  with  the  number  of  planets  in  the  solar 
system,  only  a  Middle  Age  mind  could  or  can  perceive. 
Because  he  said  the  world  moved  he  was  summoned  to 
Rome,  threatened,  tried,  condemned,  and  forbidden  under 
pain  of  death  from  further  advocacy  of  the  Copernican 
theory,  and  compelled  to  live  the  remainder  of  his  life  in  the 
strictest  retirement.  Copernicus  himself,  after  twenty-three 
years  of  careful  study  of  the  heavens  and  of  all  previous 
astronomical  systems,  waited  yet  thirteen  years  longer  to 
avoid  "the  baleful  tooth  of  calumny,"  before  he  proclaimed 
(1543)  that  our  little  world  is  not  the  center  of  the  universe. 
Both  the  book  and  the  ever-certain  condemnation  came  too 


78      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

late  for  him  to  rejoice  or  suffer  on  their  account.  When 
in  a  half-conscious  state,  a  few  hours  before  he  drew  the 
last  breath  of  his  busy  life,  a  copy  of  his  great  work  was 
placed  in  his  hands.  He  never  knew  how  great  it  was.  No 
work  of  modern  times  has  so  much  extended  the  range  of 
human  intellect,  or  so  increased  in  the  minds  of  men  the 
thought  of  the  majesty  of  the  universe. 

Thus  through  such  difficulties  as  these  have  the  grandest 
achievements  been  accomplished.  The  world  as  a  whole  is 
too  much  given  to  condemning  the  new  and  clinging  to  the 
old.  It  would  be  difficult  to  find  any  great  step  of  advance- 
ment which  has  not  received  an  inconceivable  amount  of 
opposition.  The  great  inventions  of  recent  times  have  not 
been  exceptions.  The  application  of  the  powers  of  steam 
and  electricity  for  the  assistance  of  human  agency  are 
current  instances.  Dogmatic  ecclesiasticism  and  supersti- 
tious fear  have  ever  formed  and,  so  long  as  they  remain, 
ever  will  form,  well-nigh  irresistible  barriers  to  progress. 
But  since  the  blindfold  of  authority  was  snatched  from 
before  the  eyes  of  the  Christian  world,  it  has  seemed  as  if 
there  was  no  limit  to  the  devices  which  the  cunning  of 
intellect  has  conceived  and  the  ready  hand  has  fashioned. 
Along  with  an  impartial  and  genuine  increase  of  knowledge 
always  comes  an  increase  of  faith  in  the  possibilities  of  life, 
and  likewise  a  belief  that  the  true  life  of  man  consists  in 
continued  advancement. 

EFFECT  OF  THE  REFORMATION   ON  THE  STUDY  OF  LANGUAGES 

The  impulse  given  to  the  study  of  Scriptures  by  the 
reformers  resulted  in  an  assiduous  study  of  the  Hebrew  and 
Greek  Languages.  These  attainments  served  as  a  key  to 
unlock  other  departments — History,  Law,  Antiquity,  Geog- 
raphy, as  well  as  Theology.  Before  the  days  of  the  great 
reformers,  Hebrew  and  Greek  were  almost  entirely  unknown 
and  neglected.  When  they  were  first  coming  to  be  known 
they  were  condemned  by  university  authorities  and  doctors 
of  the  Church  as  a  sure  path  to  heresy.  The  opponents  of 
Reuchlin  had  never  seen  a  Greek  Testament,  and  Hebrew 
was    supposed    to    be    a    cunningly    devised    language    of 


THE  PROTEST  MOVEMENT  79 

sorcerers.  When  the  Bible  became  recognized  as  the  only 
i-ule  of  faith,  it  became  necessary  for  every  clerg}'man  to 
know  it  in  the  original  and  for  the  laity  to  possess  it  in  tlie 
vernacular.  We  may  gather  some  idea  of  the  previous 
prevailing  ignorance  of  the  clergy  as  to  these  languages  in 
Reuchlin's  time  from  what  Heresbach  relates  in  his 
"Orationes  de  Laudibus  Literatis  Graecis."  He  heard  a 
monk  tell  his  audience : 

"They  (the  heretics)  have  introduced  a  new  language 
called  Greek;  this  must  be  shunned.  It  occasions  nothing 
but  heresies.  Here  and  there  these  people  have  a  book  in 
that  language,  called  the  New  Testament.  This  book  is 
full  of  stones  and  adders.  Another  language  is  starting  up 
— the  Hebrew.  Those  that  learn  it  are  sure  to  become 
Jews."(!) 

One  result  of  the  taste  created  was  an  extensive  search 
for  manuscripts.  This  labor  was  richly  rewarded.  With 
every  success  has  come  increased  zeal  for  philological 
inquiry  and  the  consequent  intellectual  advancement.  The 
impetus  given  by  the  Reformation  to  philological  study  has 
ever  since  formed  the  basis  of  university  education. 

Upon  the  development  of  modern  languages,  it  must  be 
noticed,  has  the  effect  of  the  Reformation  been  most  salu- 
tary. Before  the  sixteenth  century  a  learned  Latin  jargon 
was  the  language  of  schools  and  books.  No  nation  can  have 
a  literature  without  a  language  of  its  own.  Even  should 
its  thinkers  write,  its  people  could  not  read  their  productions. 
Some  great  and  universally  interesting  event,  a  favorite 
topic  for  all,  exciting  all,  was  needed  to  stir  the  people  to 
talk  and  the  thinkers  to  write.  This  want  the  Reformation 
met.  It  was  a  marshalling  of  great  ideas,  and  such  a  cause 
must  have  a  great  field  of  operation  and  great  forces  to 
support  it.  Hence,  instinctively,  the  reformers,  at  the  very 
beginning,  made  direct  appeal  to  the  people.  To  do  this,  of 
course,  they  must  use  the  language  of  the  people.  During 
the  long  struggle  between  papists  and  reformers  in  Germany, 
Switzerland,  France,  the  Netherlands,  England,  and  Scot- 
land the  different  languages  were  elaborated,  purified,  and 


8o      A    RECEIVERSHIP   EOR    CIVILIZATION 

embellished  in  style.     The  German  and  English  Bibles  re- 
main literary  monuments  of  this  period. 

The  muses,  too,  partook  of  the  spirit  of  the  times,  and 
poetry  in  unprecedented  profusion  poured  forth  in  the  form 
of  dramatic,  epic,  and  lyric  works  in  the  languages  of  the 
people.  In  England  the  "Elizabethan  Age"  enriched  our 
literature  with  numerous  immortal  productions.  To  it  we 
are  indebted  for  our  Spenser,  Shakespeare,  and  Milton. 

THE  REAL  AND  DEEPER  ESSENCE  OF  THE  REFORMATION 

The  Reformation  was  a  race  awakening.  In  Ethnological 
and  Biological  aspects  it  was  the  revival  of  the  Teutonic, 
Anglo-Saxon,  and  Scandinavian  branches  of  the  Aryan  Race 
to  new  life.  Ever  since  they  emerged  from  the  forests  of  the 
North,  the  tribes  which  constituted  these  peoples  had  been 
subjected  to  powers  emanating  from  Italy.  First  they  were 
politically  conquered  by  the  Roman  legions  commanded  by 
Julius  Caesar  and  his  imperial  successors.  And  when  the 
arm  of  Roman  power  became  weakened,  and  these  Nordics 
tried  to  rise  to  independence,  the  ever-powerful  Eternal  City 
conquered  them  again  by  the  new  method  of  imposing  the 
dogmas  of  its  Roman  Religion  revised  by  the  Hebrew 
Semites  into  the  "Holy  Roman  Catholic  Christian  Faith." 

Again,  for  over  a  thousand  years  (say  from  476  to  1517), 
they  were  subjected  children  of  Great  Rome.  But  with  the 
general  waking-up  of  the  world,  begun  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  the  Anglo-Saxons  and  Germans  were  leaders.  As 
the  last  thousand-year  stage  of  oppression  had  been  reli- 
gious, so  too  the  arousal,  the  break,  came  in  religion,  and 
thence  spread  to  other  fields.  Wiclif  in  England  in  the 
fourteenth  century  and  Luther  in  Germany  in  the  sixteenth 
began  their  rebellions  against  Roman  religion.  But  even  at 
an  early  stage,  it  extended  to  a  war  against  Roman  Lang- 
uage, Roman  Law,  Roman  Science,  Roman  Education, 
Roman  Politics,  and  Roman  Economics.  The  protest  in  re- 
ligion (though  seemingly  the  one  and  only  movement)  was 
really  but  one  phase  or  incident.     There  was  a  new  world 


THE  PROTEST  MOVEMENT  8i 

movement  rising.  It  involved  a  new  cosmic  outlook.  It 
was  destined  eventually  to  throw  off  the  ancient  culture  of 
every  type.  It  set  about  the  making  of  a  New  Science,  a 
New  Religion,  a  New  Political  and  Democratic  State,  and 
a  New  Economic  and  Industrial  World. 

Much,  very  much,  of  this  has  been  done.  Much  is  yet  to 
do.     We  of  today  are  carrying  this  on. 

In  the  new  study  of  the  Heavens  the  work  is  very  ad- 
vanced. The  old  view  is  conquered.  Astronomy  stands  a 
sublime  science. 

In  the  new  study  of  the  Earth  the  victory  is  also  achieved. 
Geology  has  stretched  the  strand  of  time  to  tens  of  millions 
for  every  thousand  years  before  conceived. 

In  the  new  story  of  Life,  the  old  has  been  handed  over  to 
the  children  to  be  recited  with  their  Mother  Goose  and 
Fairy  Tales,  and  Biology  in  half  a  century  has  already 
occupied  the  civilized  mind  with  its  story  of  Evolution. 

In  the  study  of  Forces  and  Substances,  the  new  sciences 
of  Physics  and  Chemistry  have  dissolved  the  superstitions 
of  transcendent  ghosts  and  gods,  and  in  their  stead  have 
led  us  to  Monism  with  immanent  substance  and  energy  in 
(oneness  of  world  basis.* 

Only  in  the  fields  where  man's  life  is,  are  the  studies 
incomplete  and  the  battles  unwon.  In  Anthropology,  Psy- 
chology, and  Sociology  much  remains  to  be  done.  The  old 
systems  yet  have  deep  roots.  Men  are  dominated  in  Cus- 
toms, Politics,  and  in  Economics  by  the  lingering  tyrannies 
of  the  old,  still  everywhere  claiming  the  right  to  rule. 

But  the  challenge  has  been  made.  The  "Theses"  have 
been  nailed  upon  the  doors  of  the  old  institutions.  Freedom, 
Democracy,  and  the  Physical  Basis  of  Life  will  be  demanded 
for  all — and  will  be  won  for  all. 

*  See  further,  Chapters  IX  and  XVII. 


CHAPTER  VI 
THE  MAKING  OF  MODERN  TIMES  BY  PROTEST 

THE  RE-STUDY   OF   HISTORY 

The  impulse  given  by  the  Reformation  to  the  re-study  of 
history  is  indeed  very  noteworthy.  So  much  so  that,  before 
that  great  movement,  we  do  not  expect  to  find  more  than  the 
material  for  history,  and  oftentimes  poor  material  at  that. 
The  pretenses  in  the  shape  of  annals,  chronicles,  etc.,  of  the 
Middle  Ages  are  aiiiwst  invariably  devoid  of  the  scrutinizing 
criticism  of  modern  historical  productions.  The  supersti- 
tions and  ignorance  of  those  who  kept  the  records  caused 
them  to  mistake  the  untrue  for  the  true,  the  wrong  cause 
for  the  real,  the  supernatural  for  the  natural.  Then  again 
in  the  case  of  church  chroniclers,  their  enthusiasm  for  their 
cause  made  them  blind  to  the  importance  of  other  things, 
and,  in  many  instances,  excessively  dogmatic  in  their  treat- 
ment of  the  views  of  others.  To  such  an  extent  was  this 
carried  for  hundreds  of  years,  that  the  writings  of  men  who 
were  supposed  to  differ  from  the  common  views  were 
destroyed,  sometimes  even  their  names  were  suppressed,  and 
history  was  treated  as  though  they  never  existed.  Some- 
times again,  when  a  particular  doctrine  or  practice  was  seen 
to  lack  the  historical  support  which  its  advocates  desired, 
documents  were  boldly  and  audaciously  forged,  assigned  to 
some  high  authority  in  the  age  of  the  supposed  origin  of  the 
doctrine  or  practice,  and  passed  on  into  history  as  real. 
By  such  methods  we  now  account  for  such  writings  as  the 
Clementine  Homilies,  the  Apostles'  Creed,  the  Apocryphal 
and  some  other  books  of  the  New  Testament,  the  document 
relating   to   the   Donation    of    Constantine,    etc.     By    such 

82 


MAKING  OF  MODERN  TIMES  BY  PROTEST    83 

treatment  the  true  understanding  of  the  past  becomes  irre- 
parably confused.  We  cannot  be  sure  that  we  have  yet 
ehminated  anywhere  nearly  all  such  errors,  let  alone  the 
impossibility  of  recovering  the  numerous  documents  that 
have  been  fraudulently  destroyed  or  accidentally  lost. 

But  since  the  time  of  the  Reformation  a  new  historical 
altitude  has  beciiin  to  grow.  Its  spirit  has  given  the  discern- 
ment which  is  helping  us  to  seize  the  "clew  to  the  labyrinth 
of  ages."  Through  what  we  term  the  "philosophy  of 
history"  we  believe  there  is  now  discovered  a  progressive 
tendency  of  humanity  ;  that  the  race,  like  each  individual, 
has  a  childhood  and  a  manhood ;  and  that  the  knowledge  of 
its  childhood  and  youth  is  neither  satisfactory  nor  sufficient 
for  the  stage  of  manhood  development.  The  time  has  nearly 
passed  when  men  shall  think  that  they  have  reached  a  finalit\- 
in  anything  pertaining  to  doctrine  or  practice.  From  the 
scattered  facts  of  human  conduct  we  draw  great  precepts, 
lessons,  and  prophecies.  And  we  must  expect  still  more 
advanced  ages  who  will  regard  our  comparatively  great  ad- 
vancement with  feelings  akin  to  pity. 

The  linguistic  enthusiasm  spoken  of  in  the  previous  chap- 
ters had  led  to  very  extensive  research  in  what  may  be 
collectively  termed  "Orientalism."  Instead  of  basing  Scrip- 
tural interpretations  upon  "traditions,  passages  from  the 
holy  fathers,  decisions  of  councils,  pontifical  bulls,  decretals, 
charters,  and  other  historical  monuments  true  or  counter- 
feit," Protestant  theologians  "were  obliged  to  investigate  and 
attain  exact  knowledge  of  the  places,  manners,  events,  ideas, 
v/hole  intellectual  culture,  and  the  political  and  private  state 
of  the  different  nations  during  the  period  when  this  prophet 
or  that  evangelist  had  written."  (Villers,  p  195)  Thus 
with  wonderful  zeal  have  the  sacred  and  classic  historians 
and  poets  been  traced  through  Egyptian,  Arabian,  Syriac, 
Chaldean,  Samaritan,  Persian,  Greek,  and  Roman  anti(|uities. 
Incalculable  service  was  renclered  in  this  direction  by  all  the 
reformers;  and,  up  to  the  ])resent  time,  the  study  of  all  that 
helps  to  the  understanding  of  ancient  literature  has  gone  on 
with  increasing  interest.     In  fact,  so  extensive  had  been  the 


84      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

work  done,  that  Villers  could  say  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century: 

"Whoever  is  anxious  to  be  well  informed  in  history,  in 
classical  literature,  in  philosophy,  can  use  no  better  method 
than  a  course  of  Protestant  theology."     (p.  201) 

THE  AWAKENING   ON    SOCIAL   AND   ECONOMIC  QUESTIONS 

Our  previous  inquiry  has  indicated  that  the  Reformation 
was  the  impulse  which  aroused  a  very  great  awakening  in 
several  fields  of  thought.  A  similar  activity  to  that  which 
has  been  already  noticed  took  place  in  the  realm  of  socio- 
logical subjects.  An  incalculable  amount  of  literature  upon 
questions  of  this  character  has  been  produced.  This  phase 
of  the  movement  was  late  in  starting  (about  1650),  and 
mr.de  little  headway  for  nearly  one  hunderd  and  fifty  years 
more.  During  the  nineteenth  century  it  made  great  pro- 
gress. In  our  own  century  it  has  come  forward  with  a  still 
greater  rapidity.  It  has  become  the  chief  topic  of  the  time, 
and  will  doubtless  engross  a  large  part  of  popular  interest 
for  many  years  to  come.  The  result  upon  nations  can  easily 
be  seen  by  the  most  cursory  comparisons  of  Protestant  with 
Catholic  countries.  The  nineteenth  century  conditions  of 
Italy,  Spain,  Portugal,  and  Austria,  compared  with  those  of 
England,  Scotland,  Holland,  and  Germany  tell  the  story. 
On  the  one  hand,  poverty,  indolence,  and  vice  have  been  the 
most  conspicuous  features ;  on  the  other,  some  degree  of 
comfort,  industry,  and  virtue  greeted  us  on  every  side.  It 
is  ascertained  from  statistics  that  the  number  of  criminals 
in  Catholic  countries  has  greatly  exceeded  those  in  Protest- 
ant. What  contrasts  in  agriculture,  rural  economy,  and 
local  government  meet  the  traveler  in  these  lands,  where  the 
mind  and  hand  of  man  are  at  least  on  the  way  to  freedom, 
knowledge,  and  activity ! 

Macaulay,  who  will  not  be  accused  of  partisan  leaning 
toward  dogmatic  Protestantism,  corroborates  this  view.  He 
tells  us  that  under  the  sway  of  the  Church  of  Rome — 

"The  loveliest  and  most  fertile  provinces  of  Europe  have 
been  sunk  in  poverty,  in  political  servitude,  and  in  intellect- 


MAKING  OF  MODERN  TIMES  BY  PROTEST    85 

ual  torpor;  while  Protestant  countries,  once  proverbial  for 
sterility  and  barbarism,  have  been  turned  by  skill  and  indus- 
try into  gardens,  and  can  boast  of  a  long  list  of  heroes  and 
statesmen,  philosophers  and  poets.  Whoever  knowing  what 
Italy  and  Scotland  naturally  are,  and  what  four  hundred 
years  ago  they  actually  were,  shall  now  compare  the  country 
round  Rome  with  that  round  Edinburg,  will  be  able  to  form 
some  judgment  as  to  the  tendency  of  papal  domination. 
.  .  .  The  Protestants  of  the  United  States  have  left  far 
behind  them  the  Roman  Catholics  of  Mexico,  Peru,  and 
Brazil.  The  Roman  Catholics  of  Lower  Canada  remain 
inert,  while  the  whole  continent  round  them  is  in  a  ferment 
with  Protestant  activity  and  enterprise."     (Hist,  of  Eng.  I, 

45). 

Carlyle,  in  his  inimitable  way,  writing  upon  the  influence 

of  the  Protestant  Principle,  says : 

"Austria  was  once  full  of  Protestants,  but  the  hide-bound 
Flemish-Spanish  Kaiser  element  presiding  over  it,  obstinate- 
ly for  two  centuries,  kept  saying,  'No,  we,  with  our  dull, 
obstinate,  Cimburgis  underlip,  and  lazy  eyes,  with  our  pon- 
derous Austrian  depth  of  habituality  and  indolence  of 
intellect,  we  prefer  steady  darkness  to  uncertain  light !'  and 
all  men  may  see  where  Austria  now  is."  (Hist,  of  Fred. 
II,  I,  202.) 

THE  REACTION  TRIED  BY  JESUITISM 

A  very  peculiar  intellectual  result  of  the  Reformation  is 
to  be  found  in  the  work  done  by  the  Society  of  Jesus 
founded  by  Ignatius  Loyola.  At  almost  the  same  moment 
of  Luther's  advance  upon  the  stage  of  history  from  the 
North,  Loyola  comes  from  the  South.  The  one  from  wide- 
awake, out-spoken  Saxony;  the  other  from  sleepy,  insidious 
Spain  ;  yet  both  curiously  animated  by  untiring  zeal.  One, 
the  open  advocate  of  liberty  and  reform;  the  other,  the 
secret  instrument  of  bigoted  intolerance.  Although  it  can 
hardly  be  strictly  said  that  the  order  of  Jesuits  had  its 
origin  in  the  Reformational  movement,  yet  it  was  turned 
at  once  into  a   counteracting   force  against  the  supposed 


86      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

object  of  the  Reformation.  It  took  on  much  of  the  educa- 
tional spirit  of  the  age.  The  schools  under  its  control 
helped  much  to  spread  the  taste  for  philological  and  tnathe- 
matical  studies.  Europe  had  tasted  of  the  tree  of 
knowledge.  In  fact  the  desire  for  knowledge  was  so  wide- 
spread that  it  was  no  longer  safe  to  oppose  it  openly.  The 
next  best  thing  was  to  get  possession  of  the  knowledge  and 
guide  it  in  the  interests  of  the  hierarchy.  Against  the  plain 
facts  of  the  reformers  they  opposed  crafty,  dogmatic  expla- 
nation, and  the  ignorant  were  lulled  again  into  security. 
In  this  underhanded  maner  the  people  were  also  taught  to 
hate  the  new  views  of  religion.  On  the  one  hand,  the 
Jesuits  manifested  inconceivable  talent  in  the  cultivation 
and  perfection  of  those  branches  of  knowledge  which 
threatened  not  the  least  danger  to  the  hierarchical  system. 
On  the  other  hand,  they  exhibited  an  opposition  just  as 
decisive  against  the  study  of  those  branches  which  might 
throw  light  upon  the  misdeeds  of  the  Church,  or  in  any  way 
incite  the  people  to  a  desire  for  liberty  and  a  disposition  to 
shake  off  the  despotism  of  the  papal  system.  The  Jesuits 
hoped  by  perfection  in  such  branches  as  mathematics  and 
language  to  obtain  the  reputation  of  being  the  oldest  and 
most  learned  scholars  of  Christendom,  and  thus  to  clear  the 
Church  of  the  reproach  of  the  reformers.  Possessed  of 
this  celebrity,  they  trusted  they  would  be  able  to  direct  the 
study  of  history,  science,  philosophy,  and  theology  at  pleas- 
ure. 

It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  Jesuits  strove  eagerly 
to  make  difficult,  ridiculous,  and  forgotten  all  those  studies 
which  tended  to  that  enlightenment  which  made  inquiry  into 
history  and  evolution.  Jesuitism  has  sent  forth  from  its 
schools  many  fine  Latin  scholars,  skilful  translators  and 
grammarians,  keen  mathematicians,  great  dialecticians,  and 
eminent  orators.  Besides,  it  has  no  doubt  acted  as  a  won- 
derful stimulant  to  make  the  Protestant  ranks  labor  more 
vigorously  to  check  the  power  of  Catholicism  so  greatly 
augmented  by  Jesuitism.  Nevertheless,  it  is  to  be  lamented 
that  the  Jesuits  proved  a  mighty  force  in  suppressing  liberty, 


MAKING  OF  MODERN  TIMES  BY  PROTEST    87 

and  in  this  way  the  spread  of  the  intelligence  which  stimu- 
lates inquiry.  Consequently  those  countries  where  they  be- 
came strong — Italy,  Spain,  and  Portugal — still  wander  in  the 
darkness  of  mediaeval  ignorance  and  superstition.  Through 
its  censorship  of  the  press  and  its  book-police,  Jesuitism 
achieved  wonders  in  suppressing  Protestant  thought.  For 
example,  it  is  known  that  hundreds  of  thousands  of  copies 
of  the  little  book  called  "Of  the  Benefit  of  Christ's  Death," 
were  circulated  in  Italy  for  the  purpose  of  popularizing  the 
Lutheran  doctrine  of  "Justification  by  Faith,"  and  it  had 
been  translated  into  many  languages ;  but  it  was  so  utterly 
blotted  out  that  when  Ranke  wrote  his  "History  of  the 
Popes"  in  1834,  he  said  no  trace  of  the  work  existed. 
Hausser  tells  us  that  since  then  three  copies  of  it  have  been 
found  and  thousands  published  again. 

PROTESTANT  SECTS 

The  liberty  of  opinion  to  which  the  Reformation  gave 
birth,  itself  became  the  parent  of  numerous  denominations 
of  Protestantism.  These  children,  inheriting  the  spirit  of 
authority  and  intolerance  from  grandmother  Rome,  have 
proved  a  very  quarrelsome  family.  Down  to  the  present 
moment  the  peace  of  the  Christian  world  has  been  repeatedly 
broken  by  denominational  bickerings.  Men  seem  very  slow 
to  learn  the  lesson  of  charity,  that  the  same  demand  which 
they  make  from  others  should  in  turn  be  granted  by  them  ; 
in  other  worrjs  that  the  truest  and  purest  Christian  liberty 
grants  each  man  the  right  of  forming  a  denomination  him- 
self, if  he  so  chooses. 

The  first  reformers  clung  to  the  hope  of  ecclesiastical 
unity  through  a  settlement  of  all  difficulties  by  a  general 
rounril.  (This  thought  has  been  again  revived  in  the  now 
I)rcvailing  movements  for  "church  unity.")  Next  came  the 
effort  to  reform  the  "national  churches"  by  abolishing 
abuses  and  reconstituting  creed,  j)olity,  and  ritual.  But  .soon 
irreconcilable  divisions  arose.  Notwithstanding  all,  |)Crhaps 
"it  is  better  to  dispute  on  religion  than  to  agree  (juietly  not 


88      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

to  have  any" ;  or  to  differ  in  opinion  than  to  have  no  opinion 
at  all. 

Surely,  nothing  but  uncharitable  bigotry  would  look  upon 
the  netvly  liberated  Reason  v^ithout  expecting  to  forgive 
frequent  mistakes.  After  so  long  captivity  in  the  prison- 
house  of  scholasticism,  the  doors  are  burst,  the  chains  are 
struck  off,  and  Reason  totters  forth,  pale,  emaciated,  and 
unsteady  in  step.  No  longer  held  by  shackles  of  authority, 
she  is  bewildered.  The  unaccustomed  light  of  knowledge 
blinds  her  eyes.  Her  brain  becomes  dizzy,  and  for  a  time 
her  gait  is  very  erratic.  "Better  have  left  her  in  the 
ignorant  bliss  of  her  prison  quarters,"  tauntingly  and  la- 
mentingly  exclaims  the  ultramontanist.  "A  thousand  times, 
No,"  shouts  the  modern  advocate  of  liberty  of  opinion. 
"Let  Reason  be  free,  she  will  gain  strength  by  exercise!" 
And  so  it  has  proved.  Enough  has  been  accomplished  since 
thought  has  been  free  to  show  the  unpardonable  wrong 
inflicted  upon  humanity  for  ages  by  a  bigoted  and  selfish 
hierarchy. 

From  the  liberty  claimed  and  asserted  by  Luther  in  the 
face  of  the  most  degrading  tyranny  the  world  has  ever 
tolerated,  have  follozved  an  age  of  higher  philosophy,  a  new 
spirit  in  literature,  the  scientific  method,  a  real  history  of 
the  past,  a  beginning  toward  universal  education  and  free 
schools,  the  first  stages  of  a  political  and  economic  sympathy, 
our  national  independence,  our  civil  and  religious  liberty, 
our  unmolested  press,  our  marvelous  national  enterprise,  our 
glorious  past,  and  our  hope  of  a  still  more  glorious  future. 

Who  could  draw  even  the  outline  of  the  past  and  future 
changes  upon  the  moral  face  of  the  globe  caused  by  the 
mutual  indignation  of  two  Saxon  monks?  And  when  will 
these  changes  cease?  Certainly,  not  till  every  tottering 
throne  of  temporal  and  spiritual  despotism  shall  have  hope- 
lessly fallen  and  broken.  "Eye  hath  not  seen,  nor  ear  heard,  jj 
neither  have  entered  into  the  heart  of  man  the  things  which 
are  prepared"  for  the  world  when  Reason  and  Love  shall 
walk  side  by  side  and  together  point  the  way  for  Life. 


PART  TWO 

THE    GREATEST   TRANSITION    IN 
HUMAN    HISTORY— ACT   V. 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  LATEST  ORGANIZED  PROTESTANT-ISM 

Human  life  is  a  procession — not  very  orderly.  Even  the 
van-leaders  are  a  lot  of  unorganized  stragglers,  little  inter- 
ested in  each  other.  They  are  from  many  lands — these 
investigators,  experimenters,  discoverers,  and  correctors  of 
the  route  to  be  traveled.  The  directions  are  surely  and 
slowly  leading  to  civilization  and  enlightenment.  The  great 
multitude  of  the  procession  refuse  to  listen  to  these  living 
voices.  They  follow  sullenly  only  when  living  conditions 
compel.  They  swear  by  the  guidebooks  of  ancient  leaders 
who  long  ago  fell  out  of  the  procession.  Of  the  vanguard 
-  -The  Unorganized  Protestants — we  shall  speak  in  the  next 
chapter. 

Nearest  to  those  foremost  scouts  are  a  number  of  exclus- 
ive bands,  fairly  organized  witiiin  themselves,  but  paying 
no  attention  to  each  other.  They  hear  the  voices  of  the 
leaders  and  speculate  endlessly  about  the  journey.  They 
follow  on  haphazardly,  meanwhile  always  quoting  the  olden 
times  and  jangling  as  to  whether  it  wouldn't  have  been 
better  not  to  have  come  this  way. 

89 


90      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 


WHO  ARE  THEYr 

To  limit  our  survey  to  Christian  realms,  there  has  grown 
up  (under  the  hberty  afforded  by  the  Protest  movement) 
a  number  of  influential  bodies  who  do  not  hold  to  the  tra- 
ditional Church  doctrines,  even  in  the  manner  represented 
by  standard  Protestantism.  During  the  last  century  these 
people  have  come  forward  as  Universalists,  Unitarians, 
Christian  Scientists,  Divine  Scientists,  Theosophists,  New 
Thought-ists,  etc.  Besides  these  are  various  exceptional 
broad-minds  and  scholars  within  recognized  traditional  sects. 
These,  one  and  all,  ground  their  faith  in  some  re-explained 
way,  denying  much  of  the  old,  yet  adhering  mostly  to  what 
they  would  like  to  have  the  world  believe  was  the  "true 
Christian  principle."  But  to  all  varieties  of  the  orthodox 
who  lean  wholly  on  standard  traditional  authority,  these 
newer  Protestants  seem  to  be  undermining  religion  entirely. 
Yet  though  they  are  berated  and  denounced  nearly  as  much 
as  the  vanguard  their  numbers  steadily  increase. 

Let  us  now  gather  up  the  religious  affirmations  of  those 
who  are  trying  to  speculate  with  greater  freedom  and  to 
treat  history  more  critically.  These  points  we  .shall  not 
consider  as  a  creed,  but  simply  as  characteristics  of  the 
beliefs  of  the  latest  organized  Protestants. 

GENERAL  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  THE  NEW  PROTESTANTISM 

Three  great  features  distinguish  this  type  of  religious 
attitude: 

FREEDOM,  TRUTH,  AND  CHARACTER 

From  one  end  of  Christendom  to  the  other,  these  some- 
what more  widely  cultured  minds  insist  on  freedom  of  the 
individual  person  as  to  his  own  beliefs,  and  freedom  of 
each  particular  church  or  organization  as  to  its  government. 
In  the  same  manner  they  insist  on  getting  the  truth  from 
sources  both  ancient  and  modern,  foreign  and  domestic ;  and 
truth  only  shall  be  authority.  And  they  are  trying  to  hold 
that  no  authority  of  book  or  council  or  organization  shall 
be  regarded  as  truth  because  it  makes  such  claims.     They 


LATEST  ORGANIZED  PROTESTANT-ISM      91 

are  striving  to  insist  that  all  claims  must  alike  be  submitted 
to  test ;  that  no  assumed  dignity  can  exempt  any  article, 
creed,  or  volume ;  that  truth  only  has  dignity ;  and  that  truth 
gets  its  dignity  by  having  been  demonstrated.  What  cannot 
be  examined,  needs  to  be,  badly.  They  continually  approach 
the  spirit  of  Modern  Science,  yet  all  the  while  lay  the  greater 
stress  upon  and  quote  most  frequently  from  the  old-time 
sources.  They  insist  that  both  freedom  and  truth  get  their 
values  only  because,  when  applied,  they  make  character. 
Freedom  is  desirable  only  for  right-doing,  nor  is  there  any 
real  right-doing  without  it.  Not  less  indispensable  is  truth. 
True  character  has  truth  at  its  base.  All  other  sooner  or 
later  topples  over. 

These  bodies  repres'ent  the  highest  and  best  types  of  re- 
ligious speculation  the  world  has  yet  known.  It  will  be 
utterly  subversive  of  tradition  in  the  end.  It  professes  to 
be  free  from  it  now.  But  this  speculation  is  only  an  osten- 
sible liberty  that  it  is  taking.  Its  masses  always  side  with 
tradition  when  Science  seems  adverse.  The  leaders  keep 
quiet.  They  are  growing  shy  of  appeals  to  the  ancients. 
They  make  much  use  of  the  terms  "modern"  and  "liberal." 
In  the  following  sections  there  is  presented  some  of  their 
chief  characteristic  attitudes.  These  are  given  not  as  a 
creed,  but  as  ways  of  approach  to  great  problems.  They 
are  stated  and  supported,  much  as  their  adherents  might 
desire.  They  do  not  cover  any  type  literally,  but  are  the 
gist  of  the  new  trends  of  modern  religious  thought.  They 
never  reach  the  scientific,  but  are  fine  speculative  and  mystic 
appeals. 

CHARACTF.RISTIC  BELIEFS  OF  THE  NEWER   PROTESTANTS 

I.     The  authority  of  reason. 

This  is  supreme.  No  discussion,  even  of  other  authori- 
ties, can  go  on  without  it.  If  one  accepts  n  creed,  he  does  it 
by  his  reason,  so  far  as  he  has  any.  If  he  believes  the  Bible 
or  any  other  book  divinely  inspired,  he  does  it  by  his  reason. 
Hence,    reason    is    the    cultured    individual's    last    appeal. 


92      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Reason  is  hi.c^her  than  supposed  inspiration,  unless  he 
reaches  the  absurd  position  of  deciding  by  his  reason  that  a 
book  is  inspired,  and  then  decides  again  by  his  reason  that 
his  reason  is  thereafter  not  capable  of  examining  and  de- 
ciding upon  what  he  finds  in  the  book ! 

It  is  thmking,  knowing,  being,  doing,  that  make  person- 
ality. One  is  not  made  better  by  believing.  Belief  that 
sets  aside  reason  becomes  credulity  and  leads  to  superstition 
and  senseless  action.  In  its  very  nature  this  destroys  char- 
acter. There  is  no  real  character  in  blind  obedience. 
Moreover,  this  tends  to  hypocrisy  and  pretense.  Any  system 
of  belief  must  ultimately  come  to  a  stage  where  it  more  or 
less  contradicts  the  reason  which  is  based  on  a  wider  experi- 
ence. Then  to  stick  to  it  is  to  smother  reason,  to  grow 
to  be  a  pretender.  This  is,  always  has  been,  and  always 
will  be  the  difficulty  with  creeds, 

2.     The  unlimited  improvableness  of  humanity. 

Man's  up  trend  has  been  called  dignity  as  opposed  to 
depravity.  The  doctrine  of  depravity  in  Christendom  is 
based  on  the  story  of  Genesis.  That  story  is  a  legend  bor- 
rowed during  the  Jewish  captivity  in  Babylon  (586-536 
B.  C.)  It  is  found  in  Persian  and  Assyrian  books  long 
before  there  was  any  Jewish  record.  Similar  stories  are 
now  discovered  in  the  mythology  of  various  other  peoples. 

The  anecdotes  of  man's  creation  and  antediluvian  doings, 
as  recorded  on  Assyrian  tablets,  have  been  shown  to  be 
primitive  fancies.  Everybody  now  knows  something  of  the 
science  of  Geology,  and  through  such  knowledge  he  learns 
that  the  earth's  crust  consists  of  strata  formed  one  upon 
another  by  the  natural  forces  of  heat,  wind,  rain,  streams, 
snow,  ice,  organic  remains,  animal  work,  etc.  He  knows 
that  man  made  his  appearance  comparatively  late  as  an  in- 
habitant of  the  world.  But  he  knows  also  that  even  man 
has  been  here  hundreds  of  thoiisands  of  years — from  fifty 
to  five  hundred  times  as  long  as  the  post-exilian  account  in 
Genesis  would  make  it. 


LATEST  ORGANIZED  PROTESTANT-ISM      93 

Moreover,  everybody  who  has  heard  of  the  important 
biological  discoveries  made  during  the  last  two  generations, 
knows  that  man  himself  is  an  evolution.  Man  has  grown 
up  from  brute  condition.  He  has  been  steadily  rising  during 
all  these  years  of  residence  here.  His  fall  has  been  up ! 
Mankind  is  slowly  and  steadily  rising  in  knowledge  and  in 
inclination ;  ever  more  and  more  taking  on  the  good  and 
learning  the  true.* 

3.  The  universality  and  therefore  the  naturalness  of 
religion  to  man. 

This  is  a  particular  and  positive  statement,  based  upon  the 
modern,  wider  study  of  the  human  races.  It  stands  in 
strong  contrast  over  against  the  older  prevalent  Church 
negation  that  the  Chinese,  Hindus,  Persians,  Mohammedans, 
skeptics,  and  all  non-church-christians  are  heathen,  super- 
stitious, atheistic,  infidel,  or  irreligious.  This  definition  of 
the  scope  of  religion  includes  every  normal  human  being. 
It  comprehends  the  ancient  founders:  Zoroaster,  Confucius, 
Buddha,  Socrates,  Plato,  Aristotle,  Jesus,  Seneca,  Marcus 
Aurelhis,  and  the  prophets  and  saints  of  every  land  and  time. 
Of  course,  many  of  the  newer  organized  Protestants  would 
react  against  so  human  a  claim,  but  most  of  their  leaders 
generally  admit  it.  Many  of  them  even  include  those  re- 
jected by  a  shameless  dogmatism  as  skeptics  and  unbelievers 
in  dominant  creeds.  They  see  the  profound  piety  of  men 
like  Thomas  Paine,  whose  books  are  filled  with  the  most 
ardent  religious  faith  and  true  human  enthusiasm.  They 
see  the  futility  and  the  wickedness  of  scorning  a  man  who 
could  say,  "The  world  is  my  country,  and  to  do  good  is 
my  religion.     I  believe  in  one  God,  and  no  more." 

This  view  of  religion  could  include  even  the  great  founder 
of  modem  agnosticism — Professor  Thomas  Henry  Huxley. 
Some  claim  that  religion  is  a  matter  of  life  and  attitude  and 
allegiance,  rather  than  of  names  and  professed  adherence 


•  How  Science  is  developing  these  problems,   see   especially 
Chapters  XX  and  XXI. 


94      A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

ti)  traditions  and  creeds.  Some  are  getting  to  feel  that 
nothing  but  lack  of  understanding  could  deny  the  religious 
spirit  to  the  man  who  said,  "Science  is  creating  a  firm  and 
living  faith  in  the  existence  of  inimutal)le  moral  and  physical 
laws,  perfect  obedience  to  which  is  the  highest  possible  aim 
of  an  intelligent  being." 

4.  Devotion  to  the  great  Eternal  Unifying  power  of 
whose  being,  action,  and  laws  the  Universe  is  evidence. 

To  this,  the  most  philosophical  and  metaphysical  minds 
are  above  all  devoted.  They  insist  that  all  races  and  indi- 
viduals mean  this  when  they  talk  of  God.  To  be  man, 
means  it.     To  deny  it  to  any,  means  to  be  a  narrow  man. 

All-dispensing  World-life!     Every  race  adores  Thee, 
Finding  Thee  in  rock  or  rill  or  in  the  smiling  sky; 
Bowing  down  from  needless  fear,  over-awed  before  Thee, 
Or  lifting  up  their  eyes  in  joy  on  high. 

In  most  of  this  latest  organized  Protestantism  the  word 
"Father"  is  figuratively  used  to  designate  the  Eternal  Source 
and  Might.  It  is  a  method  of  expressing  supposed  quality 
and  attributes.  It  is  a  worshipful  phrase  copied  from  Jesus. 
It  refers  to  God  as  source  and  preserver  of  the  race,  and 
adds  human  attributes  which  are  analogous  and  justifiable, 
they  believe. 

5.  An  understanding  and  an  appreciation  of  Old-time 
Prophets  never  equalled. 

The  later  organized  Protestants  are  the  first  to  have  for 
the  spokesmen  of  old  a  reverence  which  would  try  to  look 
up  the  facts.  As  they  believe  the  end  of  each  life  is  the 
development  of  character,  that  is,  in  its  broadest  sense, 
personality;  therefore  they  revere  those  who  have  made 
great  discoveries  and  achievements  in  character.  Among 
the  leaders  of  the  ancient  moral  world,  for  example,  they 
think  none  stands  so  high  in  the  exemplification  and  embodi- 
ment of  goodness  as  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  Others  excelled 
him  in  this  or  that  erudition,  but  he  at  the  right  moment  in 


LATEST  ORGANIZED  PROTESTANT-ISM      95 

history  discovered  and  preached  the  great  doctrine  of 
universal  altruism,  of  unlimited  human  brotherhood.  Thus 
he  put  all  the  later  world  under  the  greatest  debt  of  grati- 
tude. He  was  practically  the  last  of  the  line  of  those 
ancient  Jewish  idealists  who  led  mankind  to  monotheism 
and  monogenism,  to  the  faith  of  one  God  and  one  humanity. 
His  service  and  name  have  suffered  distortion  for  centuries 
through  being  made  the  center  of  superstitious  dogmas. 
His  character  and  mission  they  are  striving  to  rescue  from 
the  disgraceful  appropriation  of  a  blatant  selfish  priesthood, 
few  of  whom  ever  glimpsed  his  real  character  and  historic 
place.  To  them  his  name  will  ever  be  the  dearest  among 
those  who  have  worked  for  a  bettered  social  relationship. 
Some  of  them  love  to  say,  it  will  forever  stand  in  Sociology 
where  that  of  Columbus  stands  in  Geography,  where  that  of 
Copernicus  stands  in  Astronomy,  where  that  of  Darwin 
stands  in  Biology- — only  it  will  be  a  hundredfold  dearer  to 
most  human  hearts  than  these,  because  his  great  contribution 
was  to  show  heart's  relation  to  heart.  Such  as  these  are 
the  men  who  first  gave  mankind  nezu  points  of  view,  real 
foundation  truths  in  their  several  realms.  Not  until  their 
discoveries  in  these  realms  could  there  be  any  real  or  per- 
manent Science,  any  stable  system  of  knowledge. 

The  ancient  ethics  was  narrow  in  limits  and  negative  in 
kind.  It  never  transcended  national  borders,  and  it  was 
rarely  ever  anything  hut  primitive  in  its  teachings.  It  was 
a  catalogue  of  "Thou  shalt  nots."  The  teaching  of  Jesus 
went  beyond  these  bounds.  It  knew  no  limit  of  race  or 
language.  All  men  were  brothers,  and  brothers  were  each 
other's  natural  helpers.  He  never  reiterated  the  Decalog 
or  the  other  old  negations.  In  his  Beatitudes  there  breathes 
the  spirit  of  unlimited  aggressive  good-doing;  and  in  his 
daily  life  this  spirit  was  nearly  carried  out. 

6.     The  Bible  in  its  proper  place. 

The  newer  Protestants  still  honor  Jewish  and  Christian 
sacred  hotjks  more  than  any  other  source  of  truth,  and 
justify  this  by  claiming  to  find  truth  in  greater  proportion 


96      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

therein.  They  are  taking  pains  to  search  elsewhere.  They 
liave  spent  years  of  hardest  toil  in  solving  the  thousand  and 
one  mysteries  connected  with  all  ancient  writings  and  the 
age-long  claims  made  for  them.  They  have  dug  up  a  score 
of  ancient  buried  cities,  and  scanned  every  brick  and  stone 
with  the  greatest  care.  They  have  deciphered  the  hiero- 
glyphics of  old  Egypt,  and  studied  their  bearing  upon  con- 
temporary peoples.  They  have  resuscitated  the  language 
of  the  old  Assyrians,  and  have  re-read  tons  of  newly  dis- 
covered cuneiform  inscriptions  of  the  old  Babylonian  and 
Ninevitish  kingdom.  They  have  compared  every  manuscript 
in  every  tongue.  They  have  compared  every  sentence  and 
word  in  every  biblical  book  with  every  ancient  quotation 
purporting  or  supposed  to  be  taken  from  that  book.  They 
have  looked  up  every  reference  in  history  making  any  allu- 
sion to  biblical  events,  doctrines,  personages,  or  literature. 
They  have  published  these  results  in  inconceivable  quantity. 
And  they  are  now  refining  and  re-digesting  all  the  informa- 
tion and  knowledge  obtained.  (And  they  are  becoming  less 
certain  about  the  value  of  ancient  guide-books.) 

7.     "The  Hope"  of  Immortality. 

We  will  observe  the  difference  of  statement.  The  old 
faith  in  its  narrow  traditional  outlook,  claimed  knowledge 
and  expressed  positive  belief.  Intelligent  people  are  using 
words  more  carefully.  Some  say,  "We  hope."  Few  of 
them  quote  so  often  Scripture  texts  for  proof.  Most  of 
them  are  not  quite  sure  that  the  ancients  knew  so  much 
more  about  these  baffling  problems,  even  though  they  spoke 
with  exceeding  boldness.  None  of  them  would  cite  as  proof 
the  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus.  Some  of  them  would 
find  support  for  their  hope  in  the  wide  scope  of  this  belief 
among  mankind.  Others  would  find  further  ground  in  the 
speculation  and  affirmations  of  philosophy ;  still  others  in  the 
corroborative  discoveries  of  facts  and  laws  through  scien- 
tific research;  and  perhaps  more,  in  suggestions  and  hints 
from  mysterious  and  not  fully  solved  psychic  phenomena. 
A  few — the  most  careful  among  them — modestly  regard  it 


LATEST  ORGANIZED  PROTESTANT-ISM      97 

as  something  over  which  men  cannot  dogmatize.  They  do 
not  regard  as  proofs  the  reasons  and  statements  drawn 
from  books  and  phenomena  which  themselves  need  proving. 
Many  of  them  think  the  human  "soul"  itself  the  deepest 
mystery  which  is  offered  for  its  study ;  and  they  reverently 
accept  the  problem,  waiting  and  striving  to  aid  in  its  solu- 
tion; and,  if  perchance,  it  may  be  that  the  soul  becomes 
immortal  by  evolution  upwards  and  into  the  spiritual  state, 
then  this,  too,  they  gratefully  accept  as  an  opportunity,  and 
strive  to  attain  that  evolution. 

At  all  events  the  more  thoughtful  are  learning  that  the 
most  earnest  longing  must  still  wait  for  that  serious,  careful 
investigation  neglected  by  former  centuries  and  by  those  who 
put  assertion  for  proof.  They  are  confident  that  men  will 
yet  solve  this  great  mystery,  as  they  have  a  thousand  others. 
Meanwhile  it  helps  nothing  to  assume  and  quote  and  boast, 
to  taunt  each  other  for  lack  of  faith.  It  is  wise  and  it  is 
honest  to  realize  the  difficulties  of  our  convictions  and  to 
show  that  we  realize  them.  In  the  full  realization,  then,  of 
these  things,  in  patient  waiting  for  the  great  discoveries  and 
investigations  which  shall  make  clearer  these  profound 
problems,  and  in  the  trust  that  the  true,  whatever  it  be,  is 
l)elter  than  brazen  error,  they  wait. 

NEWEST    PROTESTANTS    NEIOD    UNIFYING    AND   RE-ORGANIZING 

There  are  not  a  few  in  this  vanguard  and  they  should 
be  better  and  more  closely  organized.  They  are  now  too 
numerous  to  struggle  alone.  They  are  too  similar  longer  to 
miss  the  power  of  united  influence.  If  they  cared  more  for 
world  service  than  for  their  speculative  prejudices,  this 
would  soon  come  about.  We  cannot  yet  see  the  beginning 
nor  the  end  of  the  processes  of  evolution  and  life.  We 
cannot  see  the  cause  nor  the  result  of  many  things.  We 
see  enough  to  give  confidence  and  hope.  On  the  basis  of  the 
past,  we  try  the  future.  By  the  light  of  the  seen,  we  try 
the  unseen.  The  larger  the  experience  and  understanding 
of  what  has  been,  the  stronger  the  confidence  in  the  final 


98      A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

outcome.  Claiming  this  or  that  as  true  does  not  help.  To 
think  or  to  believe  a  speculation  does  not  make  a  truth. 
Time  eventually  brushes  away  all  these  boasted  unfounded 
dogmas.  A'^o  amotint  of  assertion,  no  boldness  in  preaching, 
no  unanimity  of  voting  in  council,  presbytery,  convocation, 
or  conference  can  add  any  iota  of  truth  to  statement  of 
doctrine.  Truth  is  outside  of  and  independent  of  man's 
wishes  or  prejudiced  indorsements.  He  is  to  find  it  by  in- 
vestigation, to  test  it  by  conference,  and  be  wise. 


TENNYSON   GROPINGLY  SINGS: 

"Behold,  I  know  not  anything; 
I  can  trust  that  good  shall  fall 
At  last — far  off — at  last,  to  all. 
And  every  winter  change  to  spring. 

So  runs  my  dream;  but,  what  am  I? 

An  infant  crying  in  the  night; 

An  infant  crying  for  the  light; 
And  with  no  language  but  a  cry. 

1  falter  where  I  firmly  trod, 
And  falling  with  my  weight  of  cares 
Upon  the  great  world's  altar-stairs 

That  slope  through  darkness  up  to  God; 

I  stretch  lame  hands  of  faith,  and  grope. 
And  gather  dust  and  chaff,  and  call 
To  what  I  feel  is  Lord  of  all. 

And  faintly  trust  the  larger  hope.'" 


99 


CHAPTER  VIII 
THE  UNORGANIZED  PROTEST-ANTS 

THEIR  LONG  LINEAGE 

To  many,  the  expression,  "Prophets,  Saints,  and  Scien- 
tists," may  seem  a  strange  juxtaposition  of  terms.  What  can 
Prophets  and  Scientists  have  in  common  with  each  other? 
Little  or  nothing  in  matter  of  content  of  mind;  everything 
in  function.  Let  us  try  to  go  beneath  the  surface  of  popular 
belief  and  see  the  correspondence  of  meaning  in  institutions 
which  transform  and  transform,  but  still  persist  during  ages. 
All  human  conceptions  and  activities  have  a  history,  and 
their  appearance  is  not  just  the  same  in  different  centuries. 
So  much  is  this  the  case,  that  modern  institutions  often  seem 
at  first  to  have  no  ancestry.  Science  is  generally  supposed 
to  be  something  entirely  new,  and  Prophecy  is  thought  to 
be  entirely  old — and  unique.  The  writer  of  that  fraudulent 
pamphlet  called  "The  Second  Epistle  of  Peter,"  formulated 
the  theory  for  Christendom  during  the  seventeen  hundred 
years  since  his  day,  in  the  much  flaunted  text :  "For  the 
prophecy  came  not  in  old  times  by  the  will  of  man ;  holy 
men  of  God  spake  as  they  were  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost." 

(I.  21.)* 

PROPHETS 

In  olden  times,  the  Prophets  were  believed  to  be  men  who 
enjoyed  some  special  Divine  facilities  for  the  realization  of 
truth.  They  generally  claimed  Divine  authority  for  what 
they  said,  and  sought  to  give  or  point  to  some  outward  sign 


*  Written  not  earlier  tlian  175  A.  D.,  and  ascribed  to  Peter  by 
authority  at  the  Council  of  Carthage  in  397  A.  D. 

lOO 


THE  UNORGANIZED  PROTEST-ANTS       loi 

as  evidence  of  their  proclamations.  The  word  "Prophet" 
is  from  the  Greek  and  means  to  see  before,  or  in  old  English, 
"seer."  It  was  assumed  that  he  could  look  deeper  and 
further  than  other  people.  In  ages  when  no  one  saw  very 
clearly,  all  sorts  of  common  things  were  believed  to  have 
great  significance.  Hence  the  Prophets  were  expected  to 
interpret  dreams,  visions,  omens,  special  casualties,  etc. 
The  common  people  did  not  understand  how  they  did  it. 
Nor  is  it  probable  they  themselves  often  understand  the 
real  process.  They  probably  possessed  minds  somewhat 
superior,  and  when  they  occasionally  discovered  things 
beyond  the  ken  of  the  common  people,  both  thought  it  was 
by  special  supernatural  inspiration  or  revelation.  The 
actual  truth  lay  in  the  inductive  power  of  reasoning  which 
the  man  possessed.  His  concentration  on  the  problems  of 
life  enabled  him  to  reach  easily  conclusions  which  to  others 
were  sealed  mysteries.  The  prevailing  ignorance  of  the 
times  prevented  anyone  from  seeing  the  nature  of  the 
method  unconsciously  practised.  To  minds  untrained  in 
nhserx'inq  mental  processes,  reason  is  ever  performing  won- 
ders. Hence  the  real  essence  of  the  prophet's  function  was 
the  inductive  power  of  inferring  what  was  or  will  be  from 
what  is.  But  this  is  exactly  the  fundamental  nature  of 
.Science.  They  each  deal  with  truth,  or,  as  the  ancients 
explained  it,  with  the  "Divine  Will."  The  discovery  of  it 
was  "Revelation."  The  amount  and  purity  of  it  always 
depended  on  certain  circumstances  of  facility  for  seeing, 
thoroughness  in  examination,  seriousness  and  honesty  of 
motive,  and  absence  of  hindering  prejudice. 

PROPHETS   COMMON   TO  ALL  LANDS 

Our  idea  of  the  prophets  is  derived  from  the  Old  Testa- 
ment type.  But  they  have  been  everywhere  prevalent. 
The  Shamans  of  Central  Asia,  the  Dervishes  of  Persia,  the 
Rishis  of  India,  the  Oracles  of  Greece,  the  Auqurs  of  Rome, 
the  Medicine  Men  nf  the  American  Indians,  arc  all  orders 
with  the  same  general  functions.     Christian  dogmatism  has 


102    A   RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

given  an  unjust  stigma  to  these  terms  and  this  has  efifectually 
prevented  our  seeing  the  real  nature  and  just  side  of  these 
offices.  Had  Christendom  taken  the  pains,  it  could  have 
discovered  among  the  borrowed  Prophets  before  whom  it 
bows  a  variety  little  less  broad  from  the  point  of  worthiness. 
The  Old  Testament  furnishes  samples  among  the  Prophets 
of  the  crudest  superstition  and  the  grossest  morality  along- 
side of  the  highest  idealism. 

PROPHLTIC  INSTITUTION   DISAPPEARS 

Till  after  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  era,  there  was 
no  question  as  to  the  Prophet's  being  the  sole  source  for 
the  obtainment  of  the  Divine  will.  But  in  the  second 
century,  the  institution  disappeared.  Usages  had  been 
changed  by  a  new  way  of  looking  at  religion.  All  converts 
of  the  new  reformed  Christian  faith  possessed  the  "spirit 
of  God."  This  caused  an  awakening  of  the  common  mind. 
Moreover,  the  Prophets'  functions  had  become  vicious. 
They  ventured  too  much,  descended  to  common  things,  and 
their  predictions  failed  so  often,  that  people  lost  confidence 
in  the  later  and  trusted  only  the  earlier  prophecy.  This 
helped  the  increasing  growth  of  the  authority  of  old 
"Revelation."  The  old  Prophets  and  the  new  Apostles 
grew  in  respect,  and  all  revelation  was  finally  believed  to 
be  summed  up  in  them.  All  others  were  sifted  out.  The 
later  writings  have  come  to  be  known  as  the  "Apocryphal 
Books."  This  process  could  not  have  gone  on  without  the 
increasing  use  of  writing.  Finally,  when  the  Church 
became  a  political  institution  in  the  fourth  century  (325 
A.  D.)  the  base  was  entirely  changed. 

THE  OLD   PROPHET — HIS   PERSON    AND    POWER 

As  a  man,  the  Prophet  in  the  old  times  led  a  singular  life, 
more  or  less  ascetic,  and  generally  celibate.  He  was  usually 
of  mystical  turn,  and  like  the  rest  of  his  contemporaries, 
knew   neither   the   physical   nor   the   social   world   in   any 


THE  UNORGANIZED  PROTEST-ANTS       103 

systematic  way,  though  he  was  patriotic  and  moral — some- 
times extremely  so.  His  function  was  not  so  much  to  spread 
doctrine,  as  to  furnish  it.  Hence  Prophets  were  not  so 
much  officiating  priests  or  preachers,  as  oracles  in  those 
fields  which  we  now  designate  as  religion,  politics,  land, 
usury,  slavery,  divorce,  etc.  They  were  the  first,  and  for 
long,  the  only  literary  men,  and  thereby  exercised  a  mysteri- 
ous authority.  It  is  with  difficulty  that  we  realize  the  power 
of  writing  over  minds  who  have  never  known  the  art. 
Ignorant  and  superstitious  men  attribute  to  supernatural 
and  spirit  power,  the  information  which  comes  from  the 
written  lines. 

THE  SAINTS 

The  term  "Saints"  used  in  the  New  Testament,  meant  a 
member  of  the  Church.  But  the  "Saints"  (e.  g.,  at  Ephesus) 
were  spoken  of  by  the  Apostles  as  being  a  higher,  holier 
type  than  the  rest  of  the  people.  They  enjoyed  the  special 
presence  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  their  souls.  Gradually  the 
older  saints  came  to  be  regarded  with  great  honor.  In  the 
fourth  century  the  practice  of  commemorating  and  even  of 
invoking  them  arose.  The  heroisms  of  the  early  Christians 
in  withstanding  the  persecutions  of  the  Romans,  singled 
them  out  with  especial  meaning.  Offerings  were  made  at 
their  graves.  The  Eucharist  was  celebrated  at  or  near  their 
burial  places.  Articles  were  often  put  on  the  altars  in 
memory  of  them.  This  was  undoubtedly  a  surviving  cus- 
tom, namely,  the  old  Roman  offerings  to  the  Manes,  turned 
in  a  new  direction. 

HOW   THEY   CAME  TO   BE   INVOKED 

Next  there  arose  the  practice  of  praying  for  the  peace  of 
souls  departed.  Tertullian  tells  us  it  "originated  by  tradi- 
tion, was  strengthened  by  custom,  and  observed  by  faith." 
The  martyrdoms  greatly  increased  the  tendency.  Praying 
for  and  praying  to  the  dead  were  easily  intermixed.  Those 
who  died  for  their  faith  were  holy.     The  holy  were  near  to 


104    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

God,  and  surely  they  had  influence  with  him!  Then,  why 
not  pray  to  them  and  procure  their  intercession?  Cyril 
(A.  D.  350)  says:  "We  commemorate  .  .  .  patriarchs, 
prophets,  ap<:)stles,  martyrs — that  God  at  their  prayers  and 
intercessions  would  receive  our  supplications."  Acts  like 
these  are  the  relics  of  polytheism  surviving  unconsciously. 


FINALLY  GIVEN  POST-MORTEM  TITLES 

Out  of  Invocation  came  Canonization.  After  the  merits 
of  the  dead  had  been  examined,  the  pope  decreed,  on  proper 
recommendation,  the  title  of  "Saint."  Of  course,  orthodoxy 
was  the  first  requisite.  This  is  shown  in  many  instances, 
e.  g.,  the  two  greatest  thinkers  of  the  early  church,  Origen 
and  Tertullian,  have  never  been  canonized.  In  the  very 
earliest  times,  only  martyrs  received  this  eminence;  then  the 
pure ;  then,  finally,  the  great  Church  workers — good  or  bad. 
Henry  I  was  canonized  by  Pope  Eugene  III.,  and  Edward 
the  Confessor,  by  Pope  Alexander  III.,  each  because  of 
royal  support  to  papal  measures.  The  custom  now  is  to 
wait  a  hundred  years,  and  the  evidence  has  to  be  so  strong, 
in  this  age  of  scientific  and  historic  criticism,  that  the  prac- 
tice is  becoming  rare. 


BEGAN  TO  LOSE  AUTHORITY  IN  THE  SIXTEENTH  CENTURY 

But  the  tendency  which  looked  to  either  prophets  or  saint^ 
as  the  originators  of  truth  has  long  since  been  shaken.  It 
had  sole  sway  till  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century. 
The  modification  of  Judaism  which  resulted  in  historical 
Christianit}-  (more  accurately  Churchianity),  was  entirely 
a  matter  of  ritual  and  ceremony.  The  theorizers  made  the 
death  of  Christ  the  last  of  the  blood  sacrifices.  The  deity 
was  still  the  Jehovah  of  the  Jews  unimproved  in  character. 
The  Jewish  Scriptures  held  the  same  or  even  a  stronger 
place  of  authority.  Sacrifice  was  discountenanced,  because 
in  Jesus  all  sacrifices  were  summed  up,  and  he  had  made 


THE  UNORGANIZED  PROTEST-ANTS       105 

morals  the  chief  interest.  His  teachings  were  embodied 
partly  in  the  Gospels  and  partly  in  the  traditions  of  the 
people.  By  theorizing  on  his  place  in  the  world  and  on  the 
decay  of  Judaism,  Paul  and  others  wrote  a  body  of  literature 
which  afterwards  came  to  be  called  the  New  Covenant  or 
New  Testament. 

JESUS  BETWEEN —  NEITHER  PROPHET  NOR  SAINT 

We  must  not  fail  to  note  that  in  all  this  Jesus  had  had 
no  part.  He  was  not  a  prophet  in  any  sense  that  had 
previously  been  accepted.  He  did  not  pretend  to  furnish 
new  truth.  He  only  sifted  the  old.  He  simplified,  and 
lived.  His  position  is  unique  among  the  revered  holy  men 
of  history.  Hardly  one  of  his  immediate  followers  really 
understood  him.  They  were  thinking  of  old  meanings.  In 
these  he  was  not  interested.  They  theologized.  He  lived. 
He  dropped  the  dross  of  the  old  teachings.  They  held  as 
much  of  it  as  they  could,  and  tried  to  fix  it  over  into  a 
system.  They  mixed  a  little  reason  with  a  vast  amount  of 
superstitions  and  traditions,  and  clung  to  it  as  Judaism, 
continued.  He  dropped  it  as  Judaism,  and  saved  the  kernel 
of  truth  in  it.  They  made  changes  in  it  only  where  it  was 
necessary  to  connect  their  system  to  him  and  his  amazingly 
good  life.  By  the  preachers  who  did  not  write,  the  stress 
was  largely  laid  on  the  ethical  side  of  life. 

This  went  on  for  the  first  three  hundred  years,  during 
the  period  known  as  "Evangelical  Christianity"  (or  Jesu- 
anity).  But  the  doctrinizing  tendency  triumphed  at  the 
Council  of  Nicea  in  325  A.  D.,  and  the  long  period  of 
Dogmatism  and  Ecclesiasticism  (or  Christ-ianity  and 
Church-ianity)  began.  The  systematic  development  of 
dogma  on  the  basis  of  traditions  occupied  the  minds  of  men 
for  the  next  1200  years.  And  this  was  made  possible  by 
the  necessity  of  a  regrowth  of  nations.  Rome  fell  by 
barbarian  hands,  and  barbarian  ignorance  had  to  grow  up 
again  to  civilization. 


io6    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 


MORE  RELIABLE  ORACLES   COMING 

We  have  realized  the  Middle  Age  conditions  by  the  review 
in  the  chapter  on  Wiclif.  We  there  saw  the  beginning  of 
a  great  change.  One  of  the  first  symptoms  of  a  new  ten- 
dency was  in  the  work  of  Roger  Bacon,  who  died  in  1294. 
Here  and  there  minds  became  quickened  and  inventions  and 
discoveries  followed.  The  compass  was  devised  by  Gioja 
of  Naples  in  1302;  powder  by  Schwartz  of  Cologne  between 
1320  and  1340  (though  known  to  the  Moors  in  Spain  about 
1000)  ;  and  printing  by  three  different  men,  between  1435 
and  1458.  Columbus,  Luther,  Copernicus,  and  Magellan 
were  soon  to  be  born. 

A  FEW  SAMPLE  SCIENCE-PROPHETS 

A  natural  mental  activity  had  begun  and  was  increasing. 
Wiclif,  Petrarch,  Boccacio,  and  Chaucer  lived  between  1300 
and  1400.  Huss,  Jerome,  Savonarola,  Columbus,  the 
Cabots,  and  Vasco  da  Gama  did  their  great  works  between 
1400  and  1500.  Other  great  ti*uth-lovers  and  progress- 
makers  between  1500  and  1600  were  Luther,  Melancthon, 
Zwingli,  Socinus,  Knox,  Magellan,  Kepler,  Galileo,  Vesalius, 
Shakespeare,  Montaigne,  and  Bruno.  In  that  century  they 
were  so  numerous  that  they  made  what  has  since  been  named 
"The  Great  Reformation."  We  have  seen  it  as  the  grand 
breaking-up  time — a  period  of  physical,  intellectual,  political, 
and  religious  discovery,  and  consequently  of  turmoil.  The 
old  way  of  looking  at  things  had  become  so  absurd  and  so 
tedious,  that  the  few  men  who  did  any  thinking,  rebelled. 

THE   MASTERLY   FAII.URK  OF   THE   CHURCH's   REACTION 

We  will  keep  in  mind  that  the  Church  of  Rome  was  the 
only  church.  Every  new  thing  done  by  these  men  of  moral 
courage  was  in  opposition  to  church  doctrines,  and  told  the 
most  damaging  blows.  We  have  seen  that  the  Church  made 
a  most  masterly  attempt  to  stem  the  tide,  to  react  against 
this  destroying  tendency.  The  Council  of  Trent  was  held, 
closing  in  i^6j,  after  a  memorable  session  of  eighteen  years! 


THE  UNORGANIZED  PROTEST-ANTS       107 

The  Order  of  Jesuits  was  founded  in  1534  and  received  full 
papal  sanction  in  1540;  and  the  Massacre  of  St.  Bartholo- 
mew was  perpetrated  in  1572.  And,  indeed,  the  Church  would 
have  succeeded  in  reconstructing  its  blighting  system,  had 
it  not  been  for  one  discovery,  viz. ;  that  of  the  actual  position 
of  the  earth.  That  most  revolutionizing  of  all  hooks, 
Copernicus'  "De  Orbium  Celestium  Revolutionibus" ,  was 
published  in  that  eventful  year  1543.*  It  had  been  practi- 
cally finished  in  1 530,  having  cost  him  twenty-three  years  of 
study  and  observation.  His  work  was  supplemented  by 
Galileo,  who  made  the  first  practical  telescope,  and  thus 
made  proof  of  the  Copernican  System  more  easy.  With  it, 
men  looked  out  into  the  heavens  and  saw  undreamed  of 
wonders — moons  to  Jupiter,  rings  to  Saturn,  phases  to 
Venus,  and  mountains  on  the  Moon !  In  that  same  i54Sd 
year,  Vesalius,  the  body  physician  of  the  Emperor  Charles 
V,  published  a  work  less  heralded  but  equally  important  in 
it?  field,  viz.,  his  "De  Humani  Corporis  Fabrica."  As  the 
other  revolutionized  tradition  and  began  the  true  science  of 
the  Cosmos  (the  Universe),  so  this  did  the  same  for  the 
Anthropos  (Mankind). 

But  the  Church  did  not  take  kindly  to  this  new  universe. 
The  popes  issued  pronunciamentos  and  bulls  against  it;  yet 
all  to  no  avail.  It  has  demonstrated  itself  in  a  hundred  new 
ways,  and  remains  an  impregnable  denial  of  the  orthodox 
scheme  of  the  world,  of  God,  man,  and  man's  origin  and 
destiny. 

A   METHOD  HOLIER   THAN   ANY   KNOWN    TO  ANCIENT 
SEER   OR   SAINT 

The  men  of  Science,  the  new  Prophets,  have  steadily  in- 
creased in  number;  and  beginning  with  Francis  Bacon,  they 
have  again  and  again  formulated  the  method  of  approaching 
the  unknown,  i.  e.,  of  obtaining  Divine  Revelation.  And 
their  rules  succeed. 


•  We  Bhall  havp  occasion  to  rofor  apain  and  apain  to  tliis  and 
several  momentous  and  revolutionary  evcnt.s. 


io8    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR   CIVILIZATION 

But  it  is  not  by  prayers  of  faith,  nor  through  magic  or 
alchemy,  that  they  learn  the  Divine  will.  It  is  rather  the 
prayer  of  work  directed  by  the  most  honest  observation  and 
overseen  by  the  most  righteous  scrutiny  of  reason.  And 
in  it  all,  they  show  that  faith  which  alone  remains  healthy. 
And  even  the  bigotry  and  conceit  of  the  old  Church  is  be- 
ginning to  see  that  Science  is  really  the  word  of  the  Prophets 
who  have  actually  heard  "the  voice  of  God." 

"Facts  are  stubborn  things."  So  long  as  the  earth  was 
flat  and  the  Jewish  Jehovah  was  believed  to  be  up  above  the 
blue  dome  o"f  the  heavens,  the  Church  could  not  be  contra- 
dicted. The  Prophets  and  Saints  of  tradition  were  the  sole 
sources  of  truth,  and  the  future  could  have  no  hope  of  seeing 
intellectual  and  moral  greatness.  But  when  the  good 
Copernicus  and  others  proved  those  old  foundations  to  be 
errors,  all  men  who  heard  of  it  must  forever  cease  to  trust 
to  Ecclesiastical  assumptions.  After  this,  then,  what  might 
we  not  expect  since  we  discovered  the  (jreatest  truths  in 
regions  forbidden  by  the  Church!  Gradually  Science  has 
shown  that  the  highest  truth  and  the  best  life  come,  not 
from  abnegation,  but  from  the  closest  understanding  of 
Nature.  It  is  fast  becoming  the  ideal  to  use  every  means  of 
arriving  at  a  deeper  acquaintance  with  her  facts  and  laws. 

THE  NEW  HOLY  BOOKS 

This  is  not  the  place  to  review  the  great  discoveries  in 
regard  to  the  character  and  development  of  our  world 
(Geology),  of  life  (Biology),  of  the  constitution  of  things 
in  atoms  and  masses  (Chemistry  and  Physics).  (See 
Chapter  IX  and  The  New  Bible,  Part  Four). 

The  three  facts  which  have  the  greatest  bearing  on  man's 
religious  attitude  are:  the  discovery  of  Copernicus  (the 
Heliocentric  System)  ;  the  discovery  of  Kant,  Laplace  and 
others  (its  Nebular  and  Planetesimal  Origin)  ;  and  the  dis- 
covery of  Lyell  (explaining  all  the  changes,  past  and 
present,  on  the  earth's  surface  by  uniformity  of  force  and 
law). 


THE  UNORGANIZED  PROTEST-ANTS       109 

The  three  principles  of  widest  hearing  (which  ought  to  be 
understood  by  everyone)  are:  the  Baconian  method  of 
scientific  investigation;  the  Darwinian  law  of  Natural 
Selection,  or  Nature's  mode  of  evolution  of  the  lower  life 
on  the  globe;  and  the  power  of  Reason  as  a  factor,  Pur- 
posive Selection,  man's  mode  of  giving  unlimited  scope  to 
improvability  of  life. 

THE  DIFFERENCE   BETWEEN    PROPHETS 

The  honest  Prophet  always  found  some  truth.  The  new 
Prophet,  the  man  of  Science,  finds  more  truth,  because  he 
proceeds  in  more  honest  ways.  Truth  is  the  reward  of 
character  (as  we  more  and  more  realize  by  observing  the 
results  from  the  long  and  painstaking  labors  of  men  of 
Science). 

As  of  old,  so  now,  there  are  some  true  prophets,  some 
false;  some  broad,  some  narrow.  So  too,  there  are  preach- 
ers of  all  these  sorts  of  views,  and  there  are  still  far  more 
who  preach  mostly  the  views  of  ancient  Prophets.  The 
religion  of  the  masses  has  ahvays  been  the  sort  that  belongs 
tn  the  preceding  age  or  ages. 

Religion  is  the  sum  of  one's  cosmical  and  ethical  outlooks. 
It  may  be  a  small  sum  or  a  large  one.  The  materials  for 
it  come  from  the  sources  abcjve  pointed  out.  They  may  be 
anti(|uated  entirely;  they  may  be  partly  sound  but  worm- 
eaten  by  the  errors  of  centuries ;  or  they  may  be  solid  timber. 

OUR   ATTITUDE  TOWARD  THEM — THE  EARLY  AND  THE  RECENT 

All  honor  to  all  the  men  and  women  who  hai'c  revealed 
to  us  any  whit  of  the  law  of  God!  We  pay  a  tribute  of 
respect  and  admiration  to  those  who  tried  in  olden  time, 
even  when  we  can  no  longer  follow  their  ideas. 

So  again,  the  world  will  ultimately  place  on  the  Prophets' 
Roll  of  Honor  a  long  list  of  our  modern  men  and  women 
who  have  sought  the  truth  more  than  auglil  else.  I  could 
not  mention  here  even  their  names;  but  when  (in  addition 
tn  those  T  have  spoken  of)  T  name  the  words:  Harvey, 
Newton,    Priestley,    Laplace,    LeVerrier,    Herschel,    Jones, 


no    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Rawlinson,  Lyell,  Spencer,  Huxley,  Tyndall,  Darwin,  Von 
Baer,  Joule,  Maxwell,  Thompson,  Crookes,  Flower,  Helm- 
holtz,  Schliemann,  Quatrefages,  Emerson,  Max  Muller, 
Marsh,  Cope,  Curie,  Edison,  Marconi,  it  will  be  seen  what 
a  multitude  I  have  in  mind,  and  what  a  debt  of  gratitude 
we  owe  to  these  earnest  seekers  after  Divine  things  in  our 
own  time.  These,  and  hundreds  more  in  all  fields,  are  re- 
vealing truths  of  the  Most  High  by  methods  which  we  do  not 
doubt. 

Holy  men  and  women  are  always  "moved  by  the  Holy 
Ghost,"  and  they  always  teach  as  they  are  moved,  and  they 
never  teach  for  truth  what  they  are  in  doubt  about.  More- 
over, they  never  fear  to  use  their  own  highest  powers  as 
the  Divinely  given  instrument  for  reaching  the  truth. 
Character  is  the  all-essential  condition  of  discovery.  To  be 
square  zvith  the  facts  is  a  more  serious  thing  than  most  of 
us  haz'e  yet  realised.  What  a  revolution  it  would  work  with 
the  ills  of  life,  should  we  undertake  to  each  embody  this 
simple  secret  of  all  true  greatness ! 


CHAPTER  IX 
RESULTING  CHANGE  IN  WORLD-OUTLOOK 

It  is  now  time  by  brief  survey  to  realize  what  and  how 
great  is  this  change  from  Middle  Age  to  Modern  outlook. 
Why  is  this  age  experiencing  "The  Greatest  Transition  in 
Human  History"?  The  intense  significance  of  our  present 
life  and  our  responsibility  can  only  thus  be  brought  home  to 
us  historically. 

A  man  does  not  include  his  clothes.  No  more  can  a  re- 
ligion include  all  the  dogmas  that  have  accompanied  it. 
Stripped  to  its  actual  spiritual  essence  or  nature,  Christianity 
includes  very  few  of  the  hundred  doctrines  regarding  the 
heavens,  the  earth,  the  Bible,  man,  God,  the  Devil,  etc., 
which  have  been  attached  to  it.  It  is  merely  and  simply  a 
doctrine  of  relations  between  man  and  man,  and  between 
man  and  God.  It  is  "the  Fatherhood  of  God  and  the 
Brotherhood  of  Man."  But  of  course  this  distinction  has 
not  been  clearly  seen  by  the  majority  of  its  adherents.  This 
pure  Christianity  or  Jesuanity  has  been  accompanied  by 
widely  differing  world-outlooks,  i.  e.,  astronomies,  geogra- 
phies, etc.  In  the  main,  it  brought  down  the  centuries  with 
its  varying  doctrines,  the  general  view  of  the  ancient  minds 
regarding  the  world  and  the  heavens  above  it. 

.Since  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  so  many 
discoveries  have  taken  place,  so  many  inventions  have  been 
made,  that  enlightened  men  no  longer  regard  the  universe 
as  their  forefathers  did.  Before  the  middle  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  men  took  their  science,  as  unchanged  as 
possil)le,  from  long  ago  ages.  "Reverent  ignorance  of  the 
past  forbade  their  wisest  minds  to  ask  of  Nature,"  says 
Prcjfcssor  Ilcnry  Drummond. 

Ill 


112    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 


THE  MIDDLE  AGE  OUTLOOK   CONDENSED 

The  Heavens  were  to  tlie  men  of  Dante's  time  a  firmament 
or  sky  of  ten  layers  like  concentric  bowls  inverted  over  a 
flat  world.  These  diiiferent  skies  were  peopled  with  great 
spirits  of  varying  grades  of  intelligence  and  glory.  In  the 
zenith  or  Empyrean  realms,  above  all,  sat  a  manlike  God 
upon  a  great  white  throne.     (See  Diagram). 

The  Earth  was  to  them  a  flat  disk  of  which  the  firmament 
was  the  hemispherical,  hollow  cover.  The  world  had  a  sea 
in  the  middle — Medi-terra-nean — was  composed  of  some 
five  elements:  earth,  water,  air,  fire,  and  sometimes  light  or 
something  else.  This  Cosmos  came  about  by  God's  fiat, 
from  four  to  seven  thousand  years  B.  C. 

Man  was  created  instantly  by  God  and  in  His  image.  He 
was  originally  as  perfect  as  God  (or  as  the  gods).  Men  fell 
from  God's  favor  morally,  and  the  tendency  was  inherited 
by  all  their  progeny. 

Jehovah  was  an  anthropomorphic  king,  a  god  who  was 
good  part  of  the  time.  Men  pictured  Him  in  the  image  of 
earthly  kings.  Imagination  located  him  in  the  highest  con- 
ceivable point  of  their  primitive  universe.  Here  He  sat 
upon  his  great  white  throne  surrounded  by  ministering 
angels,  and  dispensed  his  frowning  providence  to  the  little 
world  of  sinful  men. 

The  Devil  was  a  second  big  king,  a  god  with  an  ill-will 
all  the  time.  He  became  the  all-powerful  ruler  of  another 
realm  and  contested  against  the  King  of  Heaven  for  domin- 
ion upon  the  earth. 

This  world-outlook  of  the  former  times  will  be  found 
picturesquely  and  eloquently  portrayed  in  those  immortal 
literary  works :  Dante's  "Divine  Comedy"  and  Milton's 
"Paradise  Lost"  and  "Paradise  Regained".  Altogether,  this 
world-scheme  of  the  olden  time  was  the  science  of  that  time, 
that  is,  it  was  the  systematic  statement  of  what  they  knew 
or  thought  they  knew. 


IT4    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

SOME  OTHER   TRANSITION    CAUSES 

We  have  seen  that  four  hundred  years  ago  this  outlook- 
began  to  dissolve  in  men's  minds.  Like  a  kaleidoscope,  it 
has  transformed,  and  never  will  it  appear  again. 

The  literary,  political,  educational,  economical,  and 
geographical  causes  have  been  mentioned  in  Chapters  1 1 
to  VI.  Some  of  the  material  transformers  shoultl  here  be 
recalled.  Of  course,  individuals  were  the  cause  of  these 
causes. 

Gunpowder.  As  a  discovery  this  was  a  simple  thing. 
But  in  its  application  it  had  the  most  far-reaching  conse- 
quences. It  broke  down  feudalism,  changed  the  method 
of  warfare,  and  made  forever  impossible  the  old  sort  of 
society.  Soil  serfdom  was  changed  to  wage  relationshij). 
Warfare  changed  its  method.  Conflict  was  no  longer  hand 
to  hand.     Brutality  was  greatly  eliminated. 

Printing.  By  this  invention  ancient  knowledge  could  no 
longer  be  hidden.  Whatever  men  knew  and  recorded  could  no 
longer  be  the  private  property  of  the  clerical  class.  Others 
could  learn  to  read  and  their  desire  could  find  means  of 
gratification.  Literature  gives  to  the  ignorant  the  compan- 
ionship of  the  wise. 

Compass.  This  was  the  result  of  experiment  and  like 
other  inventions  grew  out  of  necessity.  By  its  application 
the  unknown  lands  became  known,  and  soon  it  produced  a 
new  theory  of  the  earth.  Led  by  the  confidence  which  it 
inspired,  men  sailed  the  world  around  and  proved  the  falsity 
of  all  old  theories  concerning  it.  Geography  quadrupled 
and  grew  into  scientific  interest. 

Telescope.  Experimenting  to  help  the  infirmity  of  weak 
eyes,  men  found  an  instrument  which  added  a  thousand  fold 
to  the  penetration  of  strong  eyes.  They  turned  this  instru- 
ment outward  into  space  and  beheld  there — undreamed  of 
glories.  They  discovered  that  our  earth  has  sister  worlds 
and  that  our  stm  is  but  one  of  millions  similar,  each 
doubtless  accompanied  by  terrestrial  retinues.     Astronomy 


RESULTING  CHANGE  IN  WORLD  OUTLOOK     115 

was  revolutionized  and  added  infinite  grandeur  to  God  and 
man. 

Microscope.  From  the  infinite  they  turned  to  the  infini- 
tesimal ;  from  the  macroscopic  to  the  microscopic — by  the 
refinement  of  an  instrument  based  on  similar  principles,  they 
were  able  to  delve  into  the  profound  secrets  of  the  material 
world.  Chemistry  and  Biology  were  born  and  have  not 
ceased  to  instruct  and  delight  the  knowledge-loving  children 
of  Nature. 

THE  MODERN   OUTLOOK   CONDENSED 

By  means  of  these  and  other  inventions  and  experiments 
a  new  outlook  has  gradually  come.* 

TJic  PAements.  Instead  of  five  childish  ancient  notions 
of  the  fundamental  or  ultimate  substances  of  earth,  water, 
air,  fire,  and  light.  Science  now  knows  some  eighty  or  more 
elements :  oxygen,  hydrogen,  nitrogen,  iron,  gold,  uranium, 
radium,  etc.,  and  the  modern  mind  has  made  still  deeper 
analysis  into  molecules,  atoms,  electrons,  ions,  and  etheric 
essence.  The  Eternal  Energy  exhibits  itself  in  various 
types  and  aspects.  It  is  behind  all  as  the  universal  Spirit- 
power,  self  directing  and  teieological — "The  Power,  not 
ourselves,  that  makes  for  righteousness,"  the  essence,  the 
substance,  of  which  all  else  are  but  the  manifestations. 
{Etheric  Dynamics.) 

Creation.  IMie  man  of  today  has  learned  that  creation 
was  not  abrupt  and  sudden,  but  a  gradual,  evolving  process. 
This  applies  to  this  world  and  to  all  worlds  and  to  all  things 
on  all  worlds.  Creation  is  continuous.  It  is  never  finished. 
Evolution  is  the  word  now  more  rightly  used.  As  Drum- 
mond  says:  "Evolution  is  simple  history,  a  general  name  for 
the  history  of  the  steps  by  which  the  world  has  come  to  be 
what  it  is."  "Evolution  has  done  for  time  what  Astronomy 
has  done  for  space." 


•  See  Dr.  Andrew  D.  White's  work  "The  Warfare  of  Science' 
etc.,  two  volume.s — a  monument  of  vast  learning. 


ii6    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

The  Heavens.  The  new  heavens  have  no  measurable 
limit.  The  earth  is  not  the  center.  Even  the  sun  is  not 
the  center.  Around  it  revolves  its  own  little  train  of 
planets.  But  it  is  only  one  star  in  the  galaxy.  It  is  but  a 
flitting  point  in  the  infinite  abyss  of  Solar  Systems. 
{Astronomy.) 

The  Earth.  The  new  earth  is  a  sphere.  The  greater 
part  of  it  was  unknown  to  the  ancients.  Considered  as  a 
star,  it  is  but  a  dusky  dot  in  "yon  myriad-worlded  way." 
Considered  as  a  home  for  man  it  is  unspeakably  grand  and 
is  filled  with  amazing  wonders.     (Geology.) 

The  Forces.  It  never  occurred  to  the  ancients  to  ask 
about  gravitation,  heat,  steam,  light,  electricity,  etc.  In 
answer  to  our  investigations,  there  has  grown  up  a  vast 
aggregation  of  facts  about  forces.  These  forces  we  utilize 
in  a  hundred  aspects  of  daily  life.    (Physics  and  Chemistry.) 

Life.  To  the  ancient  mind  life  had  small  meaning.  It 
was  a  mystery  without  a  history.  The  biologist  of  today 
traces  it  through  a  thousand  evolutions  and  amid  its  myriad 
laws.  He  knows  the  effect  of  environment,  heredity,  use 
and  disuse,  natural  selection,  sexual  selection,  and  purposive 
selection.  He  can  modify  it  by  the  application  of  those 
laws.     He  can  make  it  evolve  or  devolve  at  will.    (Biology.) 

Man.  The  man  who  studies  all  this  grandeur  and  vast- 
ness  sees  himself  a  natural  part  of  the  natural  life  of  a 
natural  globe.  He  is  subject  to  the  laws  that  govern  other 
life.  But  he  is  less  subject  to  the  lower  laws  and  more 
helped  by  the  higher.  By  his  reason  he  modifies  environ- 
ment, heredity,  and  the  future.  He  is  helping  his  own 
destiny.  He  is  taking  part  in  creation.  He  is  not  the 
helpless  worm  his  forefathers  imagined  themselves.  He  is 
getting  close  to  the  "Heart  of  Nature"  and  teaching  his  own 
heart  to  beat  in  unison.  He  is  learning  the  law  of  tuning 
his  life  in  harmony  with  the  highest  he  can  discover.  He 
is  changing  the  wilderness  to  a  garden.  He  is  overspanning 
continents  and  underspanning  oceans.  Nature  mightily 
helps  him  in  every  realm.  He  rolls  over  land,  sails  over 
sea,  and  soars  through  the  air  at  will,  and  does  each  better 


RESULTING  CHANGE  IN  WORLD  OUTLOOK     117 

than  did  his  gods  of  yore.  He  communicates  with  his 
fellows  instantly  on  any  part  of  the  globe.  And  he  sees 
for  his  posterity  a  hundred  fold  greater  life  than  the  one 
which  he  now  enjoys.  He  looks  back  over  the  past  and  sees 
his  ancestry  through  thousands  of  centuries.  Like  the  rest 
of  life,  his  races  have  come  up  by  gradual  development. 
The  distance  lengthens  until  it  reaches  hundreds  of  thous- 
ands of  years.  Since  the  glacial  epochs,  between  them  and 
before,  the  archeologist  sees  traces  of  the  handiwork  of 
man  among  the  works  of  Nature.     (Anthropology.) 

Untellably  much  has  the  new  view  already  enlarged  the 
universe,  the  world,  and  human  life.  It  is  inspiring  man  to 
hopes  and  plans  and  schemes,  impossible  before.  He 
dreams  of  Heaven  here  below.  He  plans  for  a  social  para- 
dise on  earth.  He  sees  his  kinship  through  all  races.  His 
sympathy  enlarges  to  include  all  life.  He  understands  his 
fellows  better.  He  is  looking  forward  to  a  time  of  uni- 
versal, mutual,  human  helpfulness ;  and  putting  it  all 
together,  he  has  a  far  greater  trust  in  the  Eternal  Might 
that  makes  for  life  expansion. 

PRECURSORS  OF  THE  NEW  OUTLOOK 

Geography.  Columbus  (1492),  and  those  who  followed 
him  in  the  repeated  succession  of  new  discoveries,  became 
the  founders  of  a  new  Geography.  The  notion  of  the  sur- 
face and  form  of  the  earth  was  by  their  works  utterly 
changed. 

Astronomy.  Nicolaus  Copernicus  in  154^  published  the 
mo.^t  revolutionizing  of  all  books:  "De  Orbium  Celestium 
Revolutionibus."  (Concerning  the  Revolution  of  the 
Heavenly  Orbs.)  He  dethroned  human  conceit  by  making 
a  heliocentric  instead  of  geocentric  world  system.  Such 
investigators  as  Galileo,  Kepler,  Newton,  Young,  the  Her- 
schels,  Lockyer,  Huggins,  LeVerrier,  Adams,  Proctor,  and 
others  have  carried  Astronomy  and  with  it  human  thought, 
into  realms  before  unthinkable.     They  have  discovered  a 


ii8    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

I)ieviously    unknown    universe.     Thc\     have    described    it. 
They  have  added  worlds  without  end.* 

Geology.  The  first  fact  regardin.q-  the  stratification  of  the 
earth's  crust  was  stated  by  Arduino  in  1756.  This  and 
other  things  aroused  great  speculation.  Discovery  was  led 
by  Hxdtou,  Werner,  Humboldt,  and  others.  Discussion  did 
not  reach  scientific  form  until  Lyell  in  1830  published  his 
"Principles  of  Geolog}'."  In  this  work  he  proclaimed  the 
doctrine  of  Uniformitarianism,  viz.,  that  the  forces  now 
acting  in  the  ivorld  have  acted  during  infinite  ages  and  have 
gradually  produced  the  present  condition. 

Anthropology.  We  will  recall  again  that  wonderful  year 
1543.  Copernicus  began  the  revolution  of  man's  ideas  of 
the  heavens.  There  was  also  then  published  that  other  book 
destined  to  revolutionize  man's  conception  of  himself. 
Andreas  Vesalius  put  forth  his  "De  Corporis  Hum  an  i 
Fahrica."  (The  Structure  of  the  Human  Body.)  This 
was  the  beginning  of  Anatomy.  It  was  the  scientific  and 
natural  study  of  man.  From  it  has  grown  a  vast  science, 
including  all  features  and  aspects  of  the  human  being. 
Two  or  three  other  dates  are  very  significant  as  landmarks 
in  the  growth  of  the  science  of  man.  In  i7S5  Linnaeus 
{Carl  von  Linne)  published  his  "System  of  Nature,"  and  it 
contained  the  first  rational  classification  of  plants  and 
animals.  In  it  he  placed  man  at  the  head  of  the  animal 
kingdom,  a  fact  not  in  the  least  remarkable  to  us  today, 
but  of  portentous  significance  then.  In  1749  came  Buffon's 
"Human  Varieties."  Blumcnhach  graduated  from  the 
university  of  Gottingen  in  1775.  For  his  thesis,  he  pre- 
sented a  paper  on  the  various  races  of  man,  their  origin, 
characteristics,  etc.,  since  of  world-wide  celebrity.  In  1846 
Boucher  de  Perthes  discovered  numerous  implements  and 
other  evidence  of  primitive  men  at  very  remote  times  along 
the  valley  of  the  river  .Somme  in  France.  They  were 
recognized  as  belonging  to  early  Quaternary  Strata,  and 
attracted    great    curiosity    and    numerous    investigations. 


*  Further  expansion  of  this  will  be  found  in  Part  Four. 


RESULTING  CHANGE  IN  WORLD  OUTLOOK     119 

Finally  in  1863  Sir  Charles  Lyell  published  the  work  which 
compreted  the  revolution,  "The  Antiquity  of  Man."  These 
most  conspicuous  labors  have  been  supplemented  by  a  host 
of  others.  I  mention  a  few :  Pritchard,  Waltz,  Quatrefages, 
Broca,  Joly,  Darzvin,  Spencer,  Tylor,  Keith,  Osborne,  etc. 
They  have  developed  a  science  of  man  by  studying  the 
natural  history  of  man. 

THE  GAIN   OF  IT  ALL 

In  changing  from  the  old  world-outlook,  mankind  has  not 
lost,  but  has  immeasurably  gained.  Instead  of  the  little 
earth  that  surrounded  the  Mediterranean  Sea,  we  have 
gained  Asia,  Africa,  America,  and  Australia.  Instead  of 
the  immovable  disk  on  which  the  few  men  who  started 
history  lived,  we  have  a  sphere  ten  times  as  far  around  as 
their  world  was  broad.  Instead  of  standing  in  eternal  still- 
ness, our  world-star  is  whirling  onward  in  space  through 
starry  realms  at  a  speed  inconceivable  in  their  day.  Instead 
of  the  fixed  sky  with  ten  layers  shutting  man  in  beyond 
possible  knowledge  of  celestial  mysteries,  we  behold  an 
infinite  realm,  open  and  free,  dotted  with  innumerable  suns 
and  worlds,  spangled  with  unspeakable  glories.  Instead  of  a 
mankind  which  harl  irretrievably  fallen  under  the  disgrace 
and  wrath  of  an  arbitrary  tyrant-God,  we  belong  to  a  race 
which  is  rising  during  countless  ages  from  lowest  savagery 
and  barbarism  to  unthinkable  enlightened  grandeur.  And 
instead  of  a  God  too  far  removed  from  human  access,  a 
G(jd  dealing  out  his  arbitrary  commands  with  wrathful 
vengeance  in  primitive  human  fashion,  we  have  an  infinite, 
all  i)crvading  .Spirit-God  manifest  in  every  atom  and  star, 
in  lowest  and  highest  life. 

This  is  marvelous  advance.  We  cannot  be  too  thankful 
to  the  great  and  the  good  who  have  helped  to  make  this 
change.  It  is  the  labor  of  ages.  It  came  not  at  once  nor 
by  any  one  indivirlual.  It  is  the  result  of  a  tendency,  an 
ifleal,  striven  after  by  many  for  centuries.  We  speak  of  it 
a*;  having  been  begun  at  the  Reformation;  as  having  been 


120    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

put  into  form  by  Bacon  in  his  "Novum  Organum."  Alto- 
gether, we  sometimes  call  it  the  "Method  of  Modern 
Science."  No  word  nor  words  nor  set  of  phrases  can  name 
it  nor  adequately  describe  it.  It  is  a  part  of  our  great 
human  heritage.  It  is  a  movement  which  the  heritage  has 
undergone  in  modern  times. 

AN   ADVANCING  OUTLOOK 

Modern  knowledge  never  sits  down.  Science  has  no 
Ultima  Thule.  We  must  find  the  aim  of  life  in  living. 
The  Cosmos  and  the  Anthropo-cosmos  are  for  us  bottomless. 
Progress  will  never  end.  We  must  always  say,  "Ignoramus 
et  ignorabimus."  We  fill  old  hopes  and  new  arise !  We  are 
in  the  midst  of  an  infinite  progression.  Science  is  always 
solving  old  ignorances,  but  it  is  always  revealing  new  ones. 
There  is  now  vastly  more  known  than  ever  before,  but 
there  is  also  more  known  to  be  unknown.  Nature  ultimately 
answers  every  query,  but  in  doing  so,  gives  us  a  clue  or  a 
hint  of  a  truth  farther  on  and  a  life  higher  up.  We  follow 
the  lead,  and  find  we  are  made  for  upward  living. 

And  how  untellably  grand  this  is !  Could  we  reach  a  limit 
and  know  it,  we  would  feel  ourselves  imprisoned.  How 
much  better  the  interminable  vistas  of  the  universe,  with 
their  partly  understood  yet  always  transcending  nature  and 
beauty,  than  a  world  of  stale  facts  and  laws  in  which  the 
.sole  business  of  life  was  a  routine  of  changeless  sameness! 
What  a  meaningless,  tiresome  thing  would  a  kaleidoscope 
be  which  turned  ever  the  same  forms  to  view !  Some  have 
imagined  it  would  be  for  the  glory  of  God  to  turn  our  world 
into  such  a  condition  as  this,  to  fix  upon  the  men  of  all  time 
the  same  views  and  forms  of  thought,  of  religion,  of  society, 
and  so  for  ages  they  tried  to  check  all  spontaneity  in  them- 
selves and  others.  But  the  great  life  power  that  turns  the 
scenes  brings  on  in  time  new  elements,  and  ere  we  are  aware 
of  it,  a  new  world  appears.  One  of  these  millenial  shakings 
the  former  thought-world  is  now  undergoing. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  'MID  THE  NEW-TIME 

NEEDS 

Given  the  present  world  of  facts  and  knowledge  and  social 
conditions,  IVhat  ought  the  religious  leader  to  he?  We  can 
answer  this  with  a  degree  of  intelligence  only  by  inquiring 
what  he  is  and  was,  and  by  seeing  how  the  conditions  have 
changed. 

That  the  coming  preacher  will  be  above  reproach  regard- 
ing all  the  vices  of  the  ordinary  forbidden  list,  I  shall,  of 
course,  assume.  He  will  be  a  man  who  knows  and  obeys 
moral  laws  as  nearly  as  men  can;  a  man  of  clean  life  and 
habits.  This  is  too  evident  to  need  discussion.  The  oughts 
to  which  I  refer  are  inductions  in  an  as  yet  little  recognized 
field  of  ethics.  They  are  mostly  of  an  intellectual  character 
and  have  grown  out  of  greatly  changed  conditions. 

RELIGION    IS   WHAT? 

My  major  premise  will  be  the  comparatively  new  defini- 
tion of  religion.  For  if  religion  is  the  learning  of  Jewish 
literature  and  the  conforming  of  life  to  its  behests,  then 
l)Oth  Christian  and  Jewish  religious  leaders  now  are  and 
have  been  for  centuries,  very  nearly  what  they  ought  to  be; 
but  if  religion  is  learning  the  world  conception  according  to 
the  knoxi'n  facts  at  a  given  time,  and  making  this  real  in  a 
high  spiritual  life,  then  is  the  preaching  profession  as  a 
whole  in  greater  need  of  reform  than  any  other.  I  shall 
speak  of  religion  as  arising  in  some  attitude  of  the  human 
mind  toward  some  phase  of  Nature.     Complete  religion  is 

121 


122    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

the  whole  soul  going  out  to  the  universe, — intellectually, 
morally,  esthetically.  Practical  religion  is  the  sense  of  duty 
in  daily  discovering  and  obeying  the  laws  of  man's  being,  of 
Nature's  being,  of  man's  relation  to  man,  and  of  man's 
relation  to  Nature.  The  highest  worship  is  habitual  ad- 
miration and  incessant  consequent  action  in  one  or  more 
directions. 

CHURCH  A  SOCIOLOGICAL  PHENOMENON 

Since  the  beginning  of  man's  social  differentiation  the 
Church  (or  what  is  its  equivalent)  has  been  one  of  the  two 
or  three  most  important  human  interests.  (T  am,  of  course, 
thinking  of  it  not  as  the  definite  Christian  institution  which 
had  its  origin  something  less  than  1900  years  ago,  but  as  that 
far  wider  socialized  function  which  has  existed  since  man 
began  to  wonder  and  worship.)  My  message  is  to  speak 
of  the  priesthood  as  a  vast  human  institution,  not  in  denomi- 
national relations. 

FAMILY,  CLAN,  TRIBE,  AND  CONSEQUENT  CHIEFTAINSHIP 

The  earliest  society  was  a  clan  of  some  sort.  Of  this 
the  oldest  or  strongest  father  was  head  and  leader  in  all 
affairs,  after  landed  property  became  a  custom.  This 
natural  headship  was  the  result  of  male  physical  superiority, 
won  while  fighting  for  property  through  ages  of  conflict  in 
c(»mbats  w^ith  other  males  and  with  hostile  Nature.  ^Vhen 
the  primitive  family  increased  to  several  sub-families,  it 
became  a  clan.  Of  this  clan,  the  strongest  and  shrewdest 
was  naturally  chief.  When  the  chief  grew  old,  he  still  held 
his  headship  by  virtue  of  his  supposed  greater  wisdom  and 
experience.  Finally  the  chief  came  to  be  called  the 
patriarch  or  highest  father.  While  the  cluster  was  relatively 
small,  the  patriarch  could  be  the  domestic,  political,  and 
religious  chief.  \Mien  the  clan  grew  large,  it  became  a 
tribe.  The  duties  of  the  chief  ship  gradually  became  more 
complex.  The  chief  must  delegate  some  of  his  offices. 
Before  this  occurred  he  had  naturally  given  up  many  of  the 


THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  123 

functions  of  domestic  headship.  The  father  in  each  sub- 
family had  become  a  family  head.  But  tribal  complexity 
was  gradually  forcing  from  the  chief  the  delegation  of  other 
functions.  First  he  sub-divides  the  departments  of  his  rule 
and  delegates  many  services  but  continues  to  maintain  the 
chief  place  in  the  political  and  religious  orders.  This  was 
the  case  of  society  in  ancient  Egypt,  Assyria,  Israel  (David's 
time),  Athens  (under  Archon  kings),  the  Kingdom  of 
Rome,  the  Empire  of  the  Middle  Ages  (Charlemagne),  the 
early  Scandinavians,  New  Zealand,  Madagascar,  Sandwich 
Islands,  and  among  Mexican  Mayas,  Peruvian  Incas,  the 
Siamese,  Japanese,  and  Chinese. 

ORIGIN  OF  PRIESTS  AND  HIERARCHY 

When  the  chief  begins  to  appoint  others  to  perform  re- 
ligious functions,  this  makes  the  beginning  of  a  priesthood. 
Parallel  with  this  there  goes  on  in  the  politico-social  relation 
a  differentiation  into  cabinet  departments,  and  later  into 
executive,  judicial,  and  legislative  machinery.  But  from 
the  sociological  standpoint  all  offices  performed  by  others 
are  proxy  representations  of  the  chief.  In  the  religious 
order,  complexity  finall\-  begot  the  position  of  chief-priest 
and  then  a  complete  hierarchy.  Only  in  its  most  developed 
stages  did  the  hierarchy  ever  attain  to  claims  of  superiority 
over  the  chief.  In  ancient  Egypt  and  the  modern  Papacy, 
the  head  of  ihc  hierarchy  rose  to  the  assumpti(jn  of  "King 
of  kings  and  Lord  of  lords."  Strabo  relates  that  at  one 
time  the  power  of  the  Egyptian  priests  was  so  great  that 
they  occasionally  ordered  the  king  to  kill  himself,  and  thai 
they  were  obeyed. 

Such,  in  brief,  was  the  evolution  of  the  priesthood. 

WHY  ANY  SUCH   OFFICE? 

A  few  words  nf)w  regarding  the  grounds,  reasons,  or 
causes  for  that  evolution.  Why  any  priestly  function  at 
all.''  And  if  aii\,  why  are  they  sf)cial  ?  When  the  primitive 
men  began  to  believe  that  those  who  died  still  lived  as  spirits, 


124    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

they  suspected  their  unseen  influence.  They  believed  these 
spirits  were  near  and  could  exercise  powers  strong  for 
good  or  evil.  Hence  there  grew  up  the  belief  that  they 
should  receive  attention  and  propitiation  by  offerings  and 
prayers.  This  implied  that  they  were  to  be  treated  with 
the  greatest  possible  respect  and  dignity.  According  to  the 
fitness  of  things,  the  chief  only  could  properly  mediate  with 
them.  Sons  were  inferior  in  rank,  and  women  still  more  so. 
Indeed,  until  within  a  century  the  position  of  woman  has 
been  so  subordinate  that  officiation  in  any  religious  function 
was  inconceivable;  even  now,  it  is  rare.  Where  the  old 
practice  of  family  worship  was  kept  up,  women  seldom 
took  part. 

In  course  of  time,  ideas  concerning  the  abode  of  the  spirits 
became  greatly  modified.  The  good  came  to  be  supposed 
to  dwell  in  realms  of  bliss  above  the  sky  and  the  bad  in 
abodes  of  darkness  and  torture  under  the  earth.  Good  and 
bad  were  of  course  defined  as  conformity  or  non-conformity 
to  the  political  and  religious  commands.  The  spirits  now 
being  so  far  away  and  consequently  not  being  supposed  to 
meddle  with  human  affairs,  the  efforts  at  propitiation  that 
were  formerly  directed  to  them  were  then  offered  to  the 
Great  Spirit  or  spirits  (the  Deity  or  deities)  who  were 
supposed  to  rule  over  the  spirit  world  (which  men  had 
created  in  the  image  of  the  sense  world). 

One  other  ground  for  this  development  consists  in  the 
fact  that  all  the  way  the  priestly  function  has  involved  the 
work  of  explaining  the  moral  side  of  human  relations  here, 
and  the  relations  of  the  here  to  the  hereafter.  The  reason 
for  this  was  grounded  in  the  deference  paid  to  the  deceased 
great.  The  highest  moral  duty  with  primitive  minds  always 
consists  in  obedience  to  the  oldest  commands.  These  com- 
mands lost  nothing  by  the  death  of  those  who  gave  them. 
After  the  appointment  and  establishment  of  a  priesthood, 
the  commands  of  the  most  ancient  and  most  revered  fathers 
were  learned  only  through  the  priests ;  hence  when  oblations 
and  sacrifices  to  spirits  and  finally  to  gods  ceased,  the  moral 
duties  of  the  priesthood  yet  remained.     They  were  natural- 


THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  125 

ists  in  the  largest  sense  of  the  temi.  Indeed  this  was  the 
real  chief  essence  of  their  function  from  the  earliest  stage, 
but  it  was  necessarily  obscured  by  the  supernatural  elements. 
We  are  today  able  to  trace  it  in  all  stages,  either  in  actual 
history  or  by  now  existing  communities.  In  the  highest 
developed  religious  organizations,  the  preacher  has  come  to 
be  an  expounder  of  the  world-and-human-outlooks,  of  Cos- 
mology and  Anthropology.  There  is  left  no  fear,  nor  any 
idea  of  needed  propitiation.  The  preacher  endeavors  to 
inspire  the  people  to  love  and  serve  each  other  and  to  know 
and  keep  the  laws  of  the  Eternal.  In  the  Catholic  Church 
we  can  see  the  priestly  development  on  a  different  plane. 
There  he  is  still  mediator.  He  preaches  less.  His  most 
conspicuous  ser\'ice  is  to  stand  between  the  people  and  their 
avenging  God  and  to  perform  the  ceremonies  supposed  to 
appease  his  anger.  In  the  various  sects  of  Protestantism 
this  evolution  is  seen  in  a  hundred  different  stages. 

MAN   IN   DANGER  FROM   GOD 

The  notion  of  an  avenging  God  has  probably  been  world- 
wide. It  arose  as  a  sort  of  reflected  necessary  support  to 
tlie  chief's  authority  in  developing  the  social  organism.  It 
has  had  the  most  powerful  influence.  When  the  arm  of  the 
chief  was  not  sufficient  to  restrain  selfish  passion,  he  threat- 
ened the  vengeance  of  Divine  assistance.  He  called 
attention  to  the  power  of  God  to  kill  by  lightning  or  other- 
wise, or  to  scourge  the  tribe  witii  famine,  pestilence,  or 
defeat  in  battle.  Men  of  the  primitive  type  always  need  the 
bracing  of  physical  threat  to  insure  their  social  obedience. 
They  have  not  enough  intelligence  on  which  to  base  the 
requisite  goodness  for  any  kind  of  social  order.  The  selfish 
impulses  are  uppermost,  and  they  suppose  that  some  things 
are  wrong  only  because  they  are  forbidden. 

As  with  the  social  commands,  so  with  the  Divine ;  the 
Tightness  and  wrongness  is  not  thought  of  as  intrinsic. 
Indeed,  the  gods,  as  George  I-'Jiot  has  somewhere  said, 
are  but   the    reflections   of   human    ideals   cast   in    gigantic 


126    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

shadows  on  the  clouds  of  Heaven.  Bad  arbitrary  people 
must  have  bad  arbitrary  gods.  Robert  Ingersoll  has  said, 
"An  honest  god  is  the  noblest  work  of  man."  This  all 
means  that  as  man  develops,  his  knowledge  and  conceptions 
of  God  improve.  In  other  words,  improvement  in  character 
is  the  road  to  advancement  in  knowledge. 

FROM   THEOCRACY  TOWARD  DEMOCRACY 

Very  slowly,  yet  steadily,  there  has  come  about  a  separa- 
tion between  relujious  and  state  duties.  History  seems  to 
point  forward  to  a  time  when  this  shall  be  complete.  In  the 
United  States,  among  the  survivals  are  the  much  laugheil 
at  annual  thanksgiving  and  fast  day  proclamations  issued 
by  our  presidents  and  governors.  In  monarchies,  even  in 
the  most  advanced  type,  there  is  still  a  considerable  mixture 
of  religious  functions  in  civic  affairs;  but  everywhere  in 
civilization  today  in  both  political  and  religious  development 
the  tendency  is  toward  democracy.  In  early  times  the 
priests  were  appointed  by  the  chiefs,  later  by  the  chief- 
priests,  then  by  popes  or  their  proxies  the  bishops,  still  later 
by  authoritative  synods,  then  by  representative  elective 
bodies.  Finally  the  people  choose  their  own  priests  and 
preachers  independently  either  of  state  or  hierarchical 
control.  The  limit  of  this  separating  evolution  has  not  yet 
been  reached,  for  there  still  exists  between  state  and  religious 
offices  a  sort  of  reciprocity  of  support.  Many  state  officers 
are  still  consecrated  by  religious  oaths  and  inauguration 
prayers  at  their  installations.  On  the  other  hand,  the  clergy 
still  perform  the  civil  function  of  marriage  and  receive 
various  political  sanctions. 

PRIESTLY    FUNCTION    ALWAYS    SAME   ESSENCE 

Now  if  we  look  again  at  the  primitive  religious  situation 
we  see  that  the  chief  mediated,  i.  e.,  made  the  offerings  and 
performed  the  ceremonies  in  behalf  of  all  the  family  or  tribe. 
.So,  too,  in  the  later  stages  of  development,  even  after  the 
feature  of  offerings  had  dropped  out,  the  priest  mediated 


THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  127 

for  all.  Finally,  when  it  becomes  manifest  that  the  media- 
tion is  assumed  only  during  certain  stages  of  ignorance,  the 
priest  still  has  for  his  function  the  inspiration  of  men  to  acts 
of  obedience  before  the  supposed  commands  of  unseen 
powers.  This  was  the  real  essence  of  the  first  offering  ever 
made  by  the  most  primitive  chief,  and  it  is  not  different  in 
kind  with  the  latest,  most  up-to-date  preaching.  The 
preacher  has  fur  his  function,  the  expounding  of  the  best 
established  lazvs  of  the  great  Eternal  Energy,  and  the  inspir- 
ing of  men  to  make  obedience  to  these  the  moral  ideal  of 
their  lives. 

The  first  chief  of  the  first-formed  human  tribe  took  the 
"facts"  of  his  day  and  exhorted  men  t<j  live  up  lo  the  laws 
that  were  supposed  to  be  revealed  out  of  human  experience. 
The  last,  most  learned,  most  philosophical,  most  compre- 
hensive liberal  religious  exponent,  after  all  these  Christian 
and  pre-Oiristian  centuries,  does  the  same  thing  out  of  that 
fountain  of  broader,  verified  human  experience  which  we 
term  "Science." 

There  is  one  striking  difl'erence.  The  early  man  based  his 
appeal  on  threat  and  fear;  the  latest  man  bases  his  chiefly 
on  human  enthusiasm  and  hope.*  For  ages,  the  early 
attitude  leaned  on  traditions  and  had  authority  for  its 
supposed  truth  ;  now  the  new  attitude  has  the  demonstrated 
truth  for  its  authority.  Once  started,  the  former  looked 
ever  backward  and  g(jt  its  inspiration  from  old  traditions; 
the  new-evolved  attitude  looks  forward  and  gets  its  inspira- 
tion from  hopeful  inductions  that  become  inspiring  ideals. 

PRIESTHOOD  ALWAYS  DEVELOPED  DOGMA   AND   FORMALITY 

From  the  first,  the  priesthood  has  dealt  with  life  in  a 
relatively  large  way.  Many  things  within  the  scope  of  its 
attemjjted  explanations  were  to  the  ordinary  mind  mys- 
terious. As  an  institution,  the  priesthood  has  from  time 
immemorial  taken  advantage  of  this  mysterious  characteris- 
tic,   and    of    the    popular    ignorance,    for    the    purpose    of 

*  See  chapter  XXI. 


128    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

deepeninsf  and  intensifying  its  own  authority.  This  has 
produced  the  most  lamentable  tendency  to  dogmas  based 
solely  on  traditions,  and  to  formality  and  hypocrisy.  These 
dogmas  have  been  propagated  age  after  age  in  defiance  of 
every  new-discovered  contradiction  of  them.  So  long  as 
the  priesthood  was  sufficiently  powerful  and  in  league  with 
state  authorities,  it  was  able  to  silence  objection  and  effec- 
tively prevent  advances  along  the  lines  here  previously 
termed  the  "human  and  world  outlooks."  Because  of  this 
persistent  adherence  to  outworn  doctrine  and  to  over-much 
ceremonialism ,  the  priesthood  has  for  at  least  ^ooo  years 
stood  more  or  less  discredited  in  the  eyes  of  the  Prophets. 
The  word  of  the  prophet  has  prevailed  in  the  long  run. 
Today  the  prophet  is  known  by  the  name  of  "Scientist." 
The  prophets  are  always  the  real  seekers  and  the  first 
possessors  of  the  truth.  The  priests  in  many  historic  in- 
stances have  even  discredited  religion  itself. 

HENCE    PROTEST-ANTISM    AND    MORE   PROTEST 

In  that  period  now  known  as  the  Renaissance,  great  con- 
fusion from  many  causes  came  into  the  religious  thought 
of  the  Occident.  Taking  advantage  of  this  confusion,  one 
after  another  expressed  and  published  religious  dissent. 
That  vast  movement  known  as  Protestantism  arose.  And 
now,  at  the  end  of  four  centuries,  those  so-called  "unbe- 
lievers" number  millions.  A  newer  and  more  advanced 
Protestantism  which  we  term  "Modern  Science"  has  during 
a  century  past  chiefly  undertaken  to  re-investigate  the 
universe,  including  every  human  problem.  The  outcome 
of  it  all  is  either  an  absolute  denial  or  a  complete  trans- 
formation of  every  traditional  doctrine  propagated  by  the 
established  priesthood  of  former  times.  It  is  resulting  in 
an  entire  reconstruction  of  human  outlook.  It  has  found 
another  half  to  our  world  and  discovered  other  worlds 
innumerable.  It  has  revealed  a  universe  never  heard  of 
before.  It  has  shown  this  universe  as  a  Unity  of  Material 
with  a  Unity  of  Law,  held  by  a  Unity  of  Power  in  a  Unity 


THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  129 

0/  Being.  Throughout  the  blue  concave  it  has  revealed  an 
Omnipresent,  All-pervading,  Eternally-Existent  Spirit- 
Energy.  Thus,  for  the  first  time  in  history,  has  religion 
been  furnished  with  a  Deity  at  once  real  and  of  illimitable 
dignity.  In  actual  fact,  religion  now  first  begins  to  learn 
and  worship  the  true  God — the  Etheric  Basic  Entity  and 
Might  of  the  Universe, 

THE  VANISHING  OF  TRADITIONAL  VIEWS 

As  to  the  old  doctrines,  in  the  new  light  it  is  becoming 
clear  that  they  are  primitive  theory.  Only  in  the  fancy  of 
early  man  and  in  the  prejudice  of  his  too  obedient  children 
could  they  ever  have  been  held.  An  enlightened  man  can 
have  no  discussion  now  as  to  the  inspiration  of  the  Bible 
in  the  old  sense;  and  so  with  the  question  of  Creation,  the 
early  perfection  and  Fall  of  the  race,  the  Godhead  of  Jesus, 
human  Salvation  from  an  angry  deity  by  blood  sacrifice,  or 
the  early  and  barbaric  Heavens  and  Hells.  These  are  no- 
tions which  held  their  place  so  long  before  the  human  mind 
only  by  the  backing  of  an  authoritative,  ignorant  priesthood, 
and  they  have  value  now  only  as  folk-lore  and  mythology 
are  of  assistance  to  history. 

Protestantism  dropped  a  few  of  the  greatest  doctrinal 
errors  and  some  of  the  primitive  ceremonies.  While 
accommodating  itself  somewhat  more  to  the  new  spirit  of 
the  modern  age,  it  still  kept  to  the  same  world-outlook  and 
to  the  same  source  of  religion.  It  based  all  on  authority, 
but  referred  the  authority  farther  back.  It  made  the  study 
of  the  most  ancient  sacred  authority  (the  Bible — if  possible 
in  the  original  tongue)  and  the  ability  to  expound  its  doc- 
trines, the  central  requirements  of  the  Protestant  preacher. 
He  must  read  these  at  every  gathering  of  the  people,  he 
must  teach  them  to  the  children,  he  must  instil  them  in  all 
possible  ways,  and  he  must  explain  away  and  stoutly  deny 
all  the  difficulties. 


T30    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

PERSISTENCE  OF  ANTIQUATED  FORMS 

Among  forms  retained,  he  must  be  installed  into  the 
mysterious  office  by  an  assumedly  "holy  ordination"  done 
by  "the  true  line"  of  apostles  and  the  "laying  on  of  their 
hands."  He  must  sermonize  always  from  "sacred  texts," 
he  must  pronounce  benedictions  in  "holy  formulas,"  he  must 
make  long  prayers  filled  with  petitions  for  everything  im- 
perfect understanding  might  desire,  and  he  must  continue 
to  officiate  at  various  old-time  ceremonies  in  the  forms 
approved  by  his  particular  sect.  Until  very  recently  (and 
still  in  many  places),  he  must  condemn  everything  new,  de- 
nounce every  discovery  of  Science,  piously  (?)  call  every- 
body an  "infidel"  or  an  "atheist"  who  dares  to  take  excep- 
tions to  this  old-time  world-scheme,  and  tell  them  (as  lov- 
ingly as  he  has  the  grace)  that  his  angry  god  will  send  them 
everlastingly  to  the  worst  torture  his  profession  has  been 
able  to  invent.  He  was  not  to  be  a  "man  among  men"  but 
he  was  to  be  a  pretended  "unworldly  saint." 

Something  like  this  has  been  the  ideal  preacher  from 
Chrysostom,  Augustine,  Benedict,  Aquinas,  Luther,  Calvin, 
Knox,  Wesley,  Edwards,  down  to  Spurgeon,  Talmage, 
Russell,  and  ten  thousand  other  still  existing  survivals. 

THE  FALLACY — OR  WORSE 

Now  the  leader  in  religious  forms  is  not  and  never  was 
a  "man  of  God"  more  than  other  men.  But  as  a  profession- 
alist  he  has  assumed  this  and  has  so  beaten  it  into  the  minds 
of  the  masses  that  millions  would  be  mortally  offended  to 
have  it  assumed  that  their  own  labor  is  equally  dignified 
and  sacred !  The  preacher  as  he  ought  to  be  will  correct 
this  superstition.  He  will  not  encourage  it  by  singling  him- 
self out  as  especially  holy.  He  will  be  just  a  man — or  a 
woman,  and  that  will  be  enough.  He  will  depend  (as  other 
people  do)  solely  on  the  good  qualities  of  the  work  he  does 
for  his  respect  and  recognition.  The  days  when  military 
trappings  and  clerical   vestments  keep  men  in  order  will 


THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  131 

have  gone  by.  Words  will  then  have  no  added  weight 
because  of  the  cut  of  the  cloth  which  covers  the  anatomy 
from  which  they  are  uttered.  The  old-time  minister  is  still 
being  made,  even  in  the  midst  of  these  new-time  ways.  He 
is  educated  apart  from  the  world.  He  studies  old-time 
thought.  He  talks  about  another  world.  He  is  so  taught 
that  he  neglects  present  human  problems.  He  denounces 
progress  and  terrorizes  those  who  might  otherwise  yearn 
for  it.  Though  the  new-time  thought  is  turning  men  around 
and  facing  them  forward,  the  old-time  preacher  is  still  here 
threatening  Divine  retribution  upon  all  who  yield  to  the 
new  and  really  human-divine  impulse. 

CULTURED  WORLX)  HAS  LEFT  HIM  BEHIND 

Now  it  is  the  thesis  of  this  volume  that  the  thought- 
directing,  thinking,  investigating  world  is  no  longer  believing 
the  world  outlook  of  this  type  of  cult  leader  (though  he  is 
still  in  the  organized  majority).  His  strongholds  are  in  the 
regions  of  least  culture.  A  single  example  should  suffice. 
The  eight  leading  denominations  (containing  eighty-two  per 
cent  of  the  communicants)  have  forty-seven  per  cent  of 
their  strength  among  that  one-third  of  our  population  called 
the  Southern  States,  while  this  one-third  of  the  people  con- 
tains over  two-thirds  of  the  illiterancy.  Among  all  this 
third  of  the  population  there  are  probably  only  three  or  four 
churches  assuming  the  new-time  thought  and  able  to  be  also 
self-sustaining!  Within  ten  miles  of  Beacon  Hill,  Boston, 
there  have  been  sixty  such  for  more  than  a  generation! 

YET  HE  GOES  ON   NOT  KNOWING  IT 

Yet  the  old-time,  self-propagating  priesthood,  for  the  most 
part,  is  still  installing  men  with  h(jl\-  ceremony  to  preach 
those  antiquated  notions  I  The  wrongness  of  this  is  not 
longer  a  matter  of  opinion.  It  is  demonstrated  that  the 
world  is  round,  that  the  world-system  is  heliocentric,  not 
geocentric,    that    there    is    no    "heaven   above"    and    "earth 


132     A    RFXEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

below,"  and  so  on  for  a  hundred  other  facts  and  laws  which 
form  the  very  foundation  of  their  religious  statement.  But 
old-time  preachers  still  tell  us  of  "up  to  Heaven"  and  "down 
to  Hell,"  of  "God  in  Heaven,"  of  "man's  fall,"  of  "human 
depravity,"  of  "creation,"  of  the  "four  quarters  of  the 
world,"  of  the  "four  winds, '  of  an  "angry  god,"  of  "blood 
reconciliation,"  etc.,  etc.  How  unfathomable  is  the  density, 
the  ignorance,  or  something  worse,  that  allows  this  sort  of 
thing  to  continue ! 

PREACHING  FOR  THE  NEW-TIME 

Does  anyone  in  holy  astonishment  ask,  "What  should  he 
preach  then?"  One  need  not  be  very  inspired  to  reply,  "Let 
him  preach  the  truth  as  it  is  understood  by  the  workers  in 
Science."  This  is  what  the  waiting  world  is  suffering  for 
lack  of.  Let  him  learn  enough  of  real  history  and  of  the 
various  modern  sciences  to  make  their  great  facts  and  prin- 
ciples the  basis  and  background  of  all  he  has  to  say.  If  a 
priest  or  preacher  understood  a  little  Astronomy  he  would 
not  speak  of  "God  in  Heaven,"  meaning  by  this  some  place 
away  from  the  earth.  And  so  on  for  countless  other  cases. 
Instead  of  so  often  citing  David  and  Paul  and  Christian 
Fathers,  let  him  cite  men  more  recently  inspired.  We  are 
all  grateful  beyond  expression  for  the  early — still  more  so 
for  the  later.  Columbus,  Magellan,  Copernicus,  and  their 
followers  have  learned  more  about  the  world  than  did 
Moses,  Joshua,  Job,  or  Isaiah.  And  yet  we  have  later  and 
better  exponents  than  even  Columbus  and  Copernicus. 
They  are  already  ancient  and  receive  our  gratitude  as 
pioneers  of  new  impulses  in  human  progress,  just  as  should 
the  still  more  ancient  men  of  Bible  times.  Galileo,  Laplace, 
and  scores  of  more  modern  star-students  have  telescopically 
examined  the  heavens  of  which  St.  John  had  but  an  unaided 
glimpse.  "God"  rehearsed  the  story  of  creation  more  fully 
to  Darwin  than  to  Moses.  Humboldt  and  Lyell  found  a 
bottom  for  the  "Bottomless  Pit"  and  can  tell  us  more  about 
the  "infernal  regions"  than  David,  Matthew,  Paul,  or  even 


THE  OLD-TIME  PREACHER  133 

Calvin,  Edwards,  or  Talmage.  A  thousand  archeologists 
today  have  learned  more  of  "Eden"  than  w^as  know^n  to  all 
Israel,  Persia,  and  Assyria  together.  Spencer  and  Drum- 
mond  (though  not  "preachers")  can  tell  us  more  about 
"God's"  real  laws  than  all  the  priests  and  preachers  who 
lived  before  i860.  Finally  and  above  all,  in  Sociology 
should  the  old-time  preachers  exchange  the  old  Leviticus  for 
the  new.  As  in  Astronomy  he  cites  Copernicus  the  dis- 
coverer of  the  solar  system, — elaborated  by  Laplace,  Her- 
schel.  Proctor,  Huggins,  Ball,  Lockyer,  Newcomb,  Lowell, 
See,  Kelvin,  and  many  more— so  in  moral,  human,  and 
spiritual  knowledge  should  he  cite  Jesus  the  discoverer  of 
Universal  Altruism, — elaborated  and  applied  by  his  latest 
profound  co-workers  Spencer,  George,  Marx,  Lester  Ward, 
Ross,  Bellamy,  Flammarion,  Howells,  Wells,  and  an  innum- 
erable list. 

Thus  we  could  go  over  in  detail  each  of  the  grand 
divisions  of  Science,  the  new  human  knowledge.  These 
are  the  books  of  the  new  Bible.  (See  Chapters  XVII, 
XVIII,  XIX.) 

We  answer  the  questions  of  what  the  preacher  is  for  and 
what  the  preacher  ought  to  be,  by  showing  how  the  priest- 
hood came  to  be.  The  preacher  has  evolved  to  the  function 
of  striving  to  raise  men  to  the  highest  outlooks  in  mind  and 
character,  to  intellectual  and  moral  heights.  Just  as  in  the 
most  primitive  times,  so  now  he  is  to  help  them  put  together 
the  supposedly  now  known  facts  of  the  universe  into  the 
most  rational  view  of  it.  Having  done  that,  he  is  to  arouse 
their  interests  to  the  most  active  earnestness  in  high  living. 
He  ought  to  he  the  summarizer  of  all  that  is  true  and  good. 
He  ought  to  be  the  hringer  of  "good  news" — the  ever  newer, 
clearer,  broader  gospel, — as  soon  as  it  is  known.  He  ought 
to  be  a  popular  science  zveekly,  not  in  the  sense  of  reporting 
every  little  detail  of  discovery,  but  in  the  larger,  broader 
way  of  presenting  and  applying  the  great  ground  principles 
of  man's  latest,  truest  world  conception. 

When  the  preacher  is  as  he  ought  to  be,  he  will  he  the 
greatest  truth-lover  in  the  world.     Facts  and  demonstrated 


134    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

laws  will  be  to  him  the  only  "Sacred  Word  of  God."  They 
will  be  his  "Thus  saith  the  Lord,"  Books  will  be  to  him 
holy  in  proportion  as  they  contain  these.  He  will  be  an 
exponent  and  not  an  opponent  of  the  movement  known  as 
Science.  He  will  have  the  new  brains  of  the  new  time,  and 
his  heart  will  beat  up  to  his  brain. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE    NEW-TIME    PREACHER   WITH    THE    NEW- 
TIME  FACTS 

In  a  curious  little  pamphlet  called  Ecclesiastes  written 
about  130  B.  C,  the  author  puts  his  words  as  if  coming 
from  the  traditionally  wise  Solomon  and  says :  "Because  the 
preacher  was  wise,  he  still  taught  the  people  knowledge." 

It  is  a  sort  of  heresy  book.  On  the  whole,  the  trend  is 
pessimism.  He  does  not  talk  much  about  God,  and  he  re- 
gards money  and  power  and  wisdom  as  often  failures  in 
producing  happiness.  Man's  notions  are  in  general  vanity. 
Without  knowing  exactly  what  it  is  for,  he  says:  "Let  us 
hear  the  conclusion  of  the  whole  matter :  Fear  God  and  keep 
his  commandments ;  for  this  is  the  whole  duty  of  man." 
The  best  help  toward  this  is  the  gathering  of  wisdom.  We 
shall  by  this  learn  how  to  do  nothing  in  excess,  and  shall 
worry  not  at  all. 

I  have  cited  these  words  with  no  intention  of  giving  an 
explanation  of  them  or  of  supporting  what  I  have  to  say, 
but  merely  of  showing  that  the  liberal  religious  ancestry 
from  very  early  times  has  made  the  preacher's  or  religious 
leader's  work  one  of  wisdom-seeking  and  teaching. 

ESSENTIALS  ONCE 

As  a  general  thing  the  Christian  world  has  not  been 
accustomed  to  think  of  ages  as  differing  or  of  the  preacher's 
mission  as  ever  anything  but  the  proclamation  of  "the  Cross" 
with  the  doctrines  that  cling  around  it.  Hence  to  them 
the  essential  religious  truths  were  a  definite  fixed  quantity. 
No  additions   were  ever  thought  of,   and  transformations 

135 


136    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

were  inconceivable.  The  whole  body  of  doctrines  and  the 
institutions  for  their  propag:ation  were  taken  for  s^'anted 
as  unique.  If  aught  else  put  in  an  appearance,  it  was 
irrelevant.  God  had  done  all  that  was  necessary  in 
spreading  before  man  his  will  and  purpose.  It  was  done 
once  for  all.  Man's  business  was  to  study  this  and  be 
saved ! 

MISTOOK   THE   CURTAIN-PICTURE  FOR  THE  DRAMA 

This  general  attitude  gradually  gave  to  the  religious  mind 
a  fixedness  of  type  and  character  that  is  hard  to  realize. 
Perhaps  a  homely  story  may  help  to  picture  this  unexpectant 
satisfied  state.  A  lady  residing  in  a  wealthy  quarter  of  a 
great  city  thought  to  give  her  country-bred  servant-girl  a 
gracious  treat  by  sending  her  to  the  opera.  The  girl  went, 
and  got  back  before  nine  o'clock.  "Why,  Mary,  what's  the 
matter?  Didn't  you  like  it?"  asked  the  mistress.  "Oh,  ever 
so  much !  It's  a  fine  painting,"  replied  the  girl.  "But  why 
are  you  back  so  soon?  Surely  you  didn't  see  it  at  all." 
"Oh  yes,  ma'am,  I  did.  I  went  in  and  sat  down,  and  looked 
at  the  beautiful  large  picture  hanging  up  in  front.  People 
kept  coming  in  and  pretty  soon  there  was  a  crowd,  all 
looking  at  the  picture.  Then  they  took  it  away;  and  some 
men  and  women  went  to  talking  up  there  about  something 
that  didn't  concern  me,  so  I  got  up  and  came  home." 

Now,  the  simplicity  of  this  poor  girl  is  of  the  same  kind 
as  that  which  has  for  centuries  characterized  most  of  the 
religious  world  regarding  religious  truth.  All  they  have 
seen  is  the  picture  on  the  curtain.  Not  the  remotest  concep- 
tion have  they  of  the  great  drama  as  a  whole.  Some  may 
have  seen  one  act.  It  is  hard  for  them  to  believe  that  there 
is  more  to  see  or  know  than  they  have  known,  hence  they 
try  to  drive  off  the  stage  the  players  who  come  on  for  the 
next  act.  What  they  saw  was  all  right,  and  they  will  not 
allow  what  may  perhaps  be  a  travesty  or  burlesque.  They 
have  somehow  assumed  that  all  the  truths  of  religion  were 
discovered  in  olden  times,  i.  e.,  that  the  first  act  was  all 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  137 

there  was  to  be.  They  found  it  very  interestinj^.  The.\- 
continue  to  study  and  discuss  it.  They  fondly  believe  and 
bravely  insist  that  this  is  all,  and  when  the  stage  manager 
sends  on  other  characters,  they  send  them  off.  Then  they 
go  on  rehearsing,  or  rather,  reading  over  the  first  act.  It 
finally  becomes  ancient,  but  still  they  keep  it  up.  Other 
players  slip  in  and  play  parts  here  and  there  until  it  gets 
more  or  less  modified  in  the  course  of  centuries ;  and  then 
we  have  what  some  one  has  characterized  as  "ancient  and 
modern  antiquity."  The  admirers  have  not  noticed  the 
changes,  and  they  honestly  and  zealously  think  that  the  parts 
they  are  reciting  are  substantially  the  same  as  the  first  actors 
played  it,  and  that  it  should  be  just  as  effective.* 

On  other  things  these  people  are  endeavoring  to  let  the 
actors  carry  forward  the  drama.  (E.  g.,  most  of  our  col- 
leges try  to  be  modern  in  the  physical  sciences  and  sometimes 
even  in  the  mental.  Not  long  ago  a  man,  in  bitter  sarcasm, 
wrote  me  about  taking  a  position  in  a  state  university, 
saying:  "I  fear  it  will  be  difficult  for  you  to  get  it,  for  our 
Directors  want  a  man  modern  in  Psychology  and  mediaeval 
in  Theology.") 

OUR   AGE   YET   VERY   TRADITIONAL 

With  some  extensive  exceptions,  it  is  about  as  true  as 
when  in  that  famous  Harvard  Divinity  School  address  of 
1838  Emerson  said:  "Tradition  characterizes  the  preaching 
of  this  country;  it  comes  out  of  the  memory  and  not  out  of 
the  soul."  Again :  "The  stationariness  of  religion ;  the 
assumption  that  the  age  of  inspiration  is  past,  that  the  Bible 
is  closed ;  the  fear  of  degrading  the  character  of  Jesus  by 
representing  him  as  a  man,  indicate  with  sufficient  clearness 
the  falsehood  of  our  Theology." 


•  For  examples,  see  the  dates  added  at  the  top  of  pages  in 
modern  Bibles  by  authority  of  Archbishop  Usher  (1654-1656), 
the  divisions  in  chapters  and  verses  with  headings  by  modern 
French  printers  (Stephanus)  in  the  17th  century,  the  multitu- 
dinous references  and  senseless  annotations  filling  modem  handy 
editions. 


138     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

1  shall  try  to  make  clear  the  fact  that  it  is  this  eternal 
effort  to  ape  the  past,  instead  of  looking  rationally  upon  it, 
which  keeps  the  world  in  such  poverty  of  faith. 


PREACHERS  STILL  NEEDED 

There  is  a  sense  in  which  the  preacher's  mission  has  been 
and  must  always  be  the  same,  i.  e.,  it  has  to  do  with  human 
ideals.  His  business  is  to  raise  men  to  outlooks — outlooks 
of  mind  and  character.  There  are  men  to  fill  other 
missions:  scientists,  investigators,  explorers,  to  furnish  the 
community  with  knowledge  and  facts  in  their  detail ;  physi- 
cians, surgeons,  physical  culturists,  to  cure  their  bodies  and 
correct  their  physical  deformities;  lawyers  to  draw  their 
deeds,  plead  their  causes,  and  write  their  wills ;  farmers  to 
raise  their  food;  tailors  to  make  their  clothes;  carpenters 
and  masons  to  build  their  houses  and  barns ;  engineers  to 
run  their  railroads ;  and  so  through  the  division  into  more 
than  6,000  kinds  of  labor.  With  this  division  the  wants  of 
man  have  increased.  Men  single-handed  cannot  any  more, 
as  in  primitive  times,  supply  their  many  needs.  Then  these 
were  few  and  simple.  But  supply  has  created  demand,  and 
demand  now  insists  on  the  continual  supply.  Each  trades- 
man's business  is  to  seek  out  in  his  sphere  the  increasing  and 
varying  needs  of  men,  and  strive  with  all  his  powers  to 
meet  them. 

BUT  SPECIAL  ORDAININGS  ARE  PRETENSES 

But  besides  those  which  we  commonly  think  of,  men 
have  other  needs  which  demand  other  tradesmen.  They 
have  gradually  set  apart  certain  trades  as  not  "trades,"  and 
made  of  them  something  mysterious.  I  have  wondered  why 
they  should  single  out  the  clergyman  and  install  him  in  his 
labors  with  sacred  rites  and  charges.  Nor  can  I  find  any 
reason  for  such  specific  isolation.  Would  not  such  a  sacred 
initiation  be  wholesome  for  other  callings,  if  for  this?  The 
preacher  is  but  a  tradesman.     He  does  a  class  of  work  for 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  139 

which  a  special  up-to-date  training  and  special  setting-apart 
of  time  and  effort  ought  to  be  necessary.  What  more  or 
what  less  do  others  do?  Is  his  work  holy?  So  is  that  of 
others.  All  work  affects  life,  and  that  is  what  makes  it 
holy — not  the  ordination.  Such  arbitrary  divisions  as 
certain  professions  have  set  up  are  farces.  They  are 
immoral.  They  imply  license  to  slight  other  fields.  Put- 
ting an  overzeal  on  this  hinders  progress  by  the  unwarranted 
assumption  of  some  super-normal  extra  holiness. 

THE  preacher's  MISSION  IN  ANY  AGE 

The  preacher's  mission  then  is,  in  general,  to  raise  man- 
kind to  the  highest  outlooks  of  mind  and  character,  to  intel- 
lectual and  moral  heights.  In  the  former,  he  is  to  help  them 
put  together  the  facts  and  knowledge  of  their  times  into  the 
most  rational  view  of  the  universe;  in  the  latter,  he  is  to 
rouse  their  ambitions  for  the  most  active  earnestness  toward 
high  living.  These  are  the  elements  common  to  preaching 
in  all  ages.  They  are  the  differentiating  characteristics  of 
this  labor.  The  substance  or  the  content  which  shall  fill 
this  form  or  character  is  what  differs  from  age  to  age.  But 
ill  this  feature,  too,  his  work  is  not  peculiar.  Grinding  is 
what  the  miller  is  ever  doing,  but  he  grinds  neither  the  same 
things  nor  in  the  same  way  in  B.  C.  1500  and  A.  D.  1900. 

And  so  with  every  other  trade.  Times  change,  and  what 
is  standard  in  material  or  method  cannot  pass  on  with  the 
centuries.  W^e  accept  no  ancient  authority  and  follow  no 
ancient  custom  to  the  letter — except  mostly  in  the  clergy- 
man's trade. 

AS  AN  INTELLECTUAL  SUMMARIZER 

I'Lveryone  knows  that  for  many  centuries  a  certain  very 
definite  view  of  God  and  His  creation,  of  the  Bible  and  its 
authority,  of  man  and  his  duly,  of  sin  and  its  remedy,  have 
governed  the  intellectual  and  moral  conduct  of  the  so-called 
civilized  part  of  the  world.     They  constitute  the  traditional 


140    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    ClVll.TZATION 

Christian  system.  While  they  were  universal,  it  was  the 
preacher's  business  to  comprehend  them,  to  sum  them  up, 
to  present  them  to  his  hearers,  and  to  demand  their  uncondi- 
tional allegiance  to  them  in  the  name  of  infallible  and 
divinely  revealed  truth.  The  minister  of  the  past  spent 
much  time  in  the  study  of  his  authority.  He  tried  to  make 
himself  a  master  of  it  at  first  hand.  He  thought  he  was 
able  to  tell  men  its  decision  on  all  things,  to  explain  its 
shades  of  meaning  and  its  seeming  discrepancies.  He  had 
a  very  definite  task,  and  for  the  most  part  he  knew  it  well 
and  performed  it,  even  though  it  did  not  further  truth  nor 
greatly  impress  the  masses  toward  progress. 

THE  NEW  CONTENT   FOR   HIS   SUMMARIES 

Today  the  condition  of  things  is  vastly  changed.  For 
some  three  hundred  years  other  actors  have  been  taking  little 
parts  in  the  play,  and  during  a  century  or  more  their  inter- 
ference has  become  so  frequent  that  in  our  day  a  new  act 
has  actually  begun.  Most  of  those  sects  who  have  tried  to 
keep  the  actors  off  have  become  less  vigorous  in  their 
opposition.  A  few  are  yet  vehement  and  look  in  holy 
dismay  at  the  on-trooping  groups  and  their  to-them-profane 
antics. 

A  new  Geography  was  the  first  to  innovate  itself.  The 
inquisitive  Columbus  disturbed  all  previous  notions  of  the 
world  by  willfully  taking  a  voyage  which  revealed  a  realm 
not  included  in  Christian  maps  and  schemes  of  creation  and 
salvation.  Then,  Copernicus  turned  all  notions  of  heaven 
over  by  proving  that  we  didn't  know  what  the  heavens  were 
because  we  had  never  taken  into  account  the  fact  that  we 
stand  head  down  as  much  as  feet  down,  or  else  that  there 
is  no  up  or  down.  Even  if  his  discovery  greatly  enlarged 
the  realm  of  creation  and  infinitely  augmented  the  majesty 
of  God,  yet  it  was  done  at  such  a  demonstration  of  the 
insignificance  of  our  world  and  of  the  colossal  egotism  of 
man  before,  that  it  could  hardly  be  gracefully  accepted  for 
a  long,  long  time. 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  141 

And  then  there  came  those  who  dug  up  the  earth  and 
went  down  into  every  pit  and  cave  and  climbed  every  moun- 
tain— men  Hke  Humboldt,  who  came  back  and  told  us  that 
we  were  living  on  an  old,  old  world, — so  old  that  we  have 
not  yet  gotten  over  the  shock.  And  some,  like  Lyell,  said 
that  man  too  was  old,  and  that  the  years  of  his  life  here 
could  hardly  be  numbered.  And  others  showed  that  his 
fore-fathers  were  not  nearly  the  ideal  parents  of  that 
poetical  Eden,  and  that  they  had  never  fallen  from  perfec- 
tion but  were  so  inconceivably  animal-like  that  it  had  re- 
quired all  these  ages  to  bring  man  up  to  the  level  of  our  time. 

About  the  same  time,  ArchcBological  Searchers  came  back 
from  Egypt,  Nineveh,  Babylon,  Phoenicia,  and  elsewhere, 
loaded  with  stores  of  comparative  history,  comparative 
philology,  and  critical  analyses  of  texts,  all  having  a  new 
conception  regarding  the  origin,  development,  and  conse- 
quently the  authority  of  the  Bible. 

Since  these,  have  come  other  troops  named  Biologists  and 
Psychologists  and  Sociologists,  and  they  have  told  us  a  lot  of 
things  about  life  and  protoplasm,  cerebrations  and  reactions, 
environments  and  economic  conditions ;  and  they  are  still 
talking,  and  we  can't  guess  how  much  these  are  really  going 
to  tell  us  about  ourselves. 

CONFUSION    CONSEQUENT   FROM    SO    MUCH    NEW 

Altogether  it  has  confused  us  a  good  deal.  We  are 
beginning  to  surmise  that  perhaps  religion,  too,  is  a  good 
deal  bigger  and  different  thing  than  we  have  ever  thought  it. 
Before  these  innovators  had  so  much  to  say,  we  supposed 
that  all  heaven  and  earth  were  very  satisfactorily  explained, 
and  some,  like  the  great  Jonathan  Edwards,  could  tell  us 
what  was  "decent"  for  the  different  members  of  the  Trinity 
to  do.  The  change  I  am  trying  to  depict  was  well  illustrated 
in  the  life  of  the  great  American  preacher,  Henry  Ward 
Beecher.  When  a  boy,  his  father.  Dr.  Lyman  Beecher, 
published  some  abstruse  theological  work.  The  child 
Henry,  having  heard  of  its  profound  learning  and  excellen- 


142     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

cies,  said  to  his  older  brother,  "Only  think!  father's  found 
out  all  about  God."  This  enthusiastic  spirit  grew  apace 
with  his  age,  and  in  his  later  years  he  found  God  and  his 
world  too  vast  for  his  superior  eloquence.  Yet  his  semions 
on  Evolution  are  a  royal  contribution  to  the  cause  of 
progress  in  treating  religious  themes. 

THE  preacher's  ATTITUDE  TO  THE  PAST 

Are  we  then  to  condemn  the  preaching  of  the  past  because 
it  was  based  upon  assumptions  not  fully  true  to  us?  By  no 
means.  The  preaching  of  the  past  filled  a  need  in  the  past, 
when  working  according  to  the  facts  and  lights  of  its  day. 
Exactly  this  is  the  work  of  preaching  in  the  present.  It 
will  fill  the  supreme  need  of  the  present  by  exhibiting  the 
light  of  the  present.  The  pulpit  it  is  which  should  hasten 
to  gather  up  the  already  great  complex  of  information  bear- 
ing on  a  new  and  brighter  human  outlook.  In  one  century, 
the  nineteenth,  the  light  which  was  shed  on  the  nature  and 
development  of  our  world  and  that  of  the  life  upon  it  was 
greater  than  the  combined  products  of  all  preceding  ages. 
More  than  this,  the  practical  means  invented  for  spreading 
this  knowledge  are  in  like  ratio  ahead  of  all  past  facilities. 
Criticism,  inquiry,  investigation,  experiment — in  a  word, 
Science — have  ever  been  attempting  to  shed  light  and  serve 
mankind,  yet,  till  recently,  by  the  mass  of  men  these  have 
been  treated  as  sins. 

SCIENCE  REPLACING  TRADITION 

The  change  has  come.  Science  has  been  so  bountiful  that 
the  world  is  listening.  To  her  belongs  the  future.  I  do 
not  mean  merely  "physical  science,"  for  this  is  not  all 
science.  Science  is  not  a  thing  or  an  ism.  Science  is  only 
a  method,  an  honest,  systematic  method  of  treating  any  line 
of  facts.  Religion,  morals,  mind  are  just  as  much  its  proper 
domain  as  are  the  laws  of  gravity  or  the  experiments  of  the 
chemical  laboratory.  It  has  begun  its  work  in  every  field, 
and  one  of  these  labors  is,  that  a  far  greater  transformation 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  143 

and  revolution  in  morals  and  religion  is  actually  taking  place 
before  us  and  in  us  than  that  which  occurred  at  the  over- 
throw of  the  ancient  religions  by  Christianity.  By  this  is 
opened  up  an  opportunity  whereby  the  preaching  profession 
may  enter  upon  a  new  era  of  usefuhiess,  if  it  seizes  the 
opportunity  before  it  is  too  late.  Just  so  sure  as  effect 
follows  cause,  so  certain  is  it  (if  moral  decay  does  not  set 
in  too  rapidly)  that  in  a  few  years  the  common  school,  the 
secular  and  scientific  newspaper,  the  reports  of  research,  the 
additions  of  myriad  inventions,  and  the  needs  and  enterprises 
of  our  everyday  business  life  will  have  instilled  into  the 
world  the  principles,  explanations,  and  leading  facts  of  what 
we  collectively  term  "Science."  Altogether,  it  will  mean — 
indeed,  it  has  already  begun  to  mean — a  new  content  of 
mind  and  a  new  life  for  man. 

Will  the  preachers  take  some  lead  in  this  inevitable  and 
glorious  movement f  W'ill  they  sum  up  for  the  people  these 
results,  and  show  their  broader  and  deeper  meaning,  their 
profoundly  religious  bearings?  Will  they  cultivate  that  true 
and  deep  morality  in  men  which  is  the  basis  of  all  progress 
and  continued  national  well-being?  Their  opportunity  for 
this  is  unique.  To  them  has  been  accorded  a  respect  and  a 
hearing  which  is  not  freely  given  to  any  other  profession. 
For  such  a  labor  there  should  be  a  preparation  of  rare  scope 
and  a  devotion  of  rarer  quality.  With  this  the  office  might 
remain  what  it  has  assumed  of  itself,  viz.,  the  first  place  in 
the  world.  But  to  do  this,  they  will  need  a  better  prepara- 
tion.    "Theological  Schools"  cannot  furnish  it. 

ABOVE  ALL  THE  PREACHER  SHOULD  WARN   AGAINST  THE  PAST 

The  preacher,  then,  is  to  show  the  people  why  they  should 
respect  the  past  and  how  they  are  to  get  inspiration  out  of  it. 
But  he  is  to  warn  them  not  to  follow  it.  The  Eternal  Might 
has  better  things  in  store  for  each  succeeding  age.  We  need 
have  no  fears  that  Evolution  will  sto[).  The  old  religious 
views  did  not  make  up  the  sum  of  religion  any  more  llian 
did  the  old  nomadic  tribal  life  under  chieftans  form  the  only 
mode  of  social  organization  and  g<jvernment.     This  struggle 


144    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

of  fear,  distrust,  and  opposition  to  the  new  is  only  a  repeti- 
tion of  the  experiences  of  our  forefathers.  The  reception 
of  those  very  phases  of  our  faith  which  we  are  now  out- 
growing was  at  the  start  just  as  fooHsh  and  unholy  to  them 
as  is  the  new  faith  to  many  of  our  time.  But,  it  set  aside 
the  old  of  those  days,  as  the  new-coming  views  are  setting 
aside  the  old  of  our  days,  and  that  too  under  vastly  less 
favorable  circumstances. 

CHRISTIANITY   EXOTIC  TO  ARYANS 

We  must  remember  that  when  the  Christian  religion  began 
its  conquering  spread  over  Europe,  it  was  an  exotic,  it  came 
from  another  race.  Scarcely  a  doctrine  or  a  practice  in  it 
came  from  any  source  other  than  the  Semites,  a  race  very 
different  in  spirit  and  genius  from  the  Aryans.  The  faith 
that  is  now  spreading  over  Europe  and  the  Aryan  world, 
that  is  slowly  and  fundamentally  modifying  the  system 
which  conquered  the  Aryans  of  old,  is  itself  a  natural  one. 
It  is  coming  out  of  the  heart  of  this  race.  It  is  based  on 
the  products  of  their  own  intellectual  genius.  For  ages 
these  western  nations  have  had  their  own  philosophy,  their 
own  science  and  literature  to  a  great  extent.  But  they 
borrowed  their  religion,  because  their  old  faiths  were  not 
ethical  enough  to  meet  the  social  new-coming  conditions. 
That  religion  the  Occident  has  been  trying  for  1500  years 
to  assimilate.  It  has  fully  extracted  the  moral  side,  but  the 
theological  and  ritualistic  parts  of  the  Asiatic-Semitic 
worship  have  never  seemed  quite  natural. 

Although  the  whole  Jewish  literature  was  virtually 
adopted  and  consecrated,  yet  the  Aryan  thinkers  have  always 
been  against  it.  Had  it  been  done  in  a  more  rational  way, 
it  might  have  had  greater  influence.  But  the  early  Chris- 
tians, with  the  most  curious  blindness,  made  all  parts  of  the 
Jewish  writings  equally  sacred, — whether  it  was  supposed 
Mosaic  commands  to  slay  unmercifully  men,  women,  and 
children  in  their  Canaanitish  invasion,  or  the  Christlike  ex- 
hortation to  love  one's  enemies  and  pray  for  those  who 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  145 

despitef ully  use  us ;  whether  it  was  the  villainous  Deutero- 
nomic  injunction  to  give  carrion  meat  to  the  visiting  stranger 
or  sell  it  to  the  alien,  or  the  lofty  ethics  of  doing  unto  others 
as  we  would  they  should  do  unto  us.     (See  Deut.  XIV,  21.) 

ARYANS   NOW  DEVELOPING  THEIR  OWN   FAITH 

But  this  uncritical  and  superstitious  tendency  is  spent. 
The  naturally  powerful  and  investigative  character  of  the 
European  nature  has  begun  to  transform  the  whole  body 
of  its  adopted  faith.  The  new  and  resulting  faith  will  be  its 
own.  It  will  be  an  organic  product  and  not  one  mechani- 
cally spliced  on.  It  will  make  liberal  use  of  the  faiths  and 
facts  of  the  past,  but  it  will  be  even  more  vigorous  in  dis- 
covering and  exhibiting  the  facts  of  the  present.  It  will  be 
taught  by  History,  and  will  be  more  taught  by  Science. 
It  will  look  to  great  and  inspiring  personages  in  the  past  for 
inspiration,  and  not  less,  even  more,  will  it  trust  in  the  spon- 
taneity of  the  broadest  and  purest  souls  of  its  own  day. 

THE  PREACHER  AS  A  MORAL  STIMULATOR 

This  leads  naturally  to  my  next  point.  The  preacher  is 
to  stand  for  good  and  to  exalt  virtue.  He  is  to  insist  on 
the  potential  good  of  the  now.  Neither  in  himself  nor  in 
others  will  he  brook  a  servile  goodness.  He  knows  that 
real  greatness  does  not  come  from  following.  He  respects 
men  and  the  books  of  men,  but  takes  no  orders  from  them. 
By  their  suggestions  and  doings  he  learns,  but  he  wills  to 
be  himself. 

A  healthy  virtue  holds  that  it  can  and  should  be  as  much 
divine  as  was  ever  hero  or  demi-god.  It  insists  on  bringing 
the  traditional  ideals  into  the  now.  Was  Jesus  great?  So 
can  I  be  by  truth.  I  am  son  of  the  same  Divinity  and  will 
be  just  as  "dearly  beloved"  when  I  live  as  true.  His  claims 
were  high — none  too  high.  Alas!  men  live  so  low  that  they 
thought  this  supernatural.  In  this  sense  will  the  preacher 
of  insight  hold  up  the  character  of  Jesus,  the  "Divine  man," 


146    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

not  exactly  as  example  but  as  inspiration,  encouraf^ement. 
And  should  he  hold  up  others?  Yes,  others  too,  wherever 
he  finds  this  embodiment.  Rut  in  Jesus  it  was  preeminent 
for  the  ancient  world,  since  he  probably  placed  a  higher 
estimate  on  man  than  any  other  character  in  history  before 
the  nineteenth  century — all  in  all  considered.  "I  and  the 
Father  are  one,"  his  followers  put  into  his  mouth.  In  our 
age  this  sountls  strange;  but  it  is  the  true  Christianity  and 
the  true  humanity  to  insist  on  the  potential  infinitude  of 
man. 

NO  QUARTER  TO   EVIL 

In  this  and  other  ways  will  the  preacher  show  the  people 
that  good  deeds  lift  them  at  once,  and  that  bad  undermine. 
Goodness  is  the  trend  of  life,  and  the  man  of  goodness 
partakes  of  the  divine  majesty  of  Nature.  But  it  must  be 
real.  Pretense  will  not  bear  the  fruit  of  virtue.  To  those 
who  have  insight  it  is  transparent;  to  others  it  is  ineffective, 
for  lack  of  soul.  Like  the  artificial  flower,  it  has  no  aroma, 
because  it  has  no  life. 

Virtue  (insight)  in  its  broadest  sense  is  the  only  life  of 
man.  It  is  positive  and  healthful.  All  else  has  a  vicious 
element — lacks  vitality,  is  cold.  But  these  are  not  real. 
They  are  only  the  vacant  place  where  life — virtue — should 
be.  All  the  great  philosophers  have  seen  evil  to  be  only 
incompleted  or  yesterday's  good.  The  assertion  of  the 
separate  actuality  of  evil  is  the  ultimate  proposition  of  un- 
faith, — the  rankest  atheism,  the  incurable  blasphemy,  the 
sheerest,  profanest  misconception  of  "God.".  In  Euripides 
we  read — 

"Goodness  and  being  in  the  Gods  are  one; 
He  who  imputes  ill  to  them,  makes  them  none." 

The  very  notion  is  contradictory;  more  so  the  thing.  The 
Devil  is  an  impossibility.     The  preacher  must  show  this. 

Denying  the  Devil  is  the  affirming  of  monistic  entity. 
"God"  is  the  power,  the  energy,  the  all-pervading  potential 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  147 

spirit  of  the  universe.  The  universe  cannot  be  deeply 
divided  against  itself.  There  is  no  place  for  the  Devil,  no 
place  for  a  permanent  bad.  Bad,  evil,  are  but  imperfect 
conceptions.  Under  a  broad  view  they  melt  like  dreams  on 
waking.  The  maintenance  of  the  two  is  a  confusion  of 
ethics  with  ontogeny,  of  social  relations  with  the  basis  of 
existence.  The  only  bad  is  the  surviving  past  interfering 
with  the  upward-moving  present. 

AS  A  PROPHET  OF  THE  "LIVING  GOD" 

I  have  insisted  before  that  the  preacher  is  to  proclaim 
the  present  world-outlook.  In  this  he  is  the  philosopher  of 
philosophers.  He  gets  his  truths  from  all  ages  and  keeps 
up  to  date.  He  ought  to  see  to  it  that  religion  is  not  de- 
graded by  becoming  stationary.  He  must  learn  and  then 
proclaim  an  ever-present  revelation, — his  former  "living 
God,"  who  is  the  knowledge  and  the  truth  in  every  advance. 
Human  life,  human  progress,  and  our  world  are  a  Bible 
never  closed.  The  "God  power"  is  as  well  as  was.  Never 
has  it  spoken  more  than  in  the  now,  be  that  now  any  moment 
of  eternity.  Who  has  ears  can  hear  the  voice ;  who  has  eyes 
can  see  the  hand. 

This  is  vital.  Of  it  the  people  must  ever  be  told,  else 
they  sink,  as  have  the  myriad  races  who  have  taken  their 
knowledge  second-hand  and  left  no  trace  that  they  have 
lived.  The  Prophet  is  a  mouthpiece  of  the  ever-active 
"Holy  Ghost."  When  such,  he  is  an  influence  immeasurable. 
When  this  is  really  true,  men  are  inspired  beyond  applause. 
Why  do  they  cheer  the  approaches  to  the  good?  Are 
goodness  and  truth  so  actually  rare  that  it  needs  applauded 
bravery  to  draw  them  out?  Is  their  "God"  a  minority  that 
men  should  fear  to  mention  his  names  and  laws?  Beware, 
when  the  best  is  so  rare  that  its  appearance  has  to  be 
applauded. 

When  this  spirit  of  G(jd,  i.  e.,  this  highest  human,  is 
abroad,  life  is  calm.  Are  the  times  loud?  Then  are  the 
faults  deep.     Do  men  have  to  shout  for  hearings?     Then 


148    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

are  the  hearers  depraved  or  primitive.  Are  men  driven  to 
acts  of  violence  to  get  and  keep  life?  It  is  growing  law 
speaking  against  present  conditions.  Whether  now  heard 
or  not,  it  will  be  obeyed.  The  "Providence"  that  moves  the 
spheres  (if  such  we  call  it)  is  the  same  Might  that  makes 
also  for  righteousness.  If  we  are  not  with  it,  some  of  these 
days  we  shall  die,  and  then  will  be  removed  our  stupid, 
selfish  hindrance.     But  still  will  go  on  the  trend  of  Being: 

.  .  .  "One  law,  one  element, 

And  one  far  off  divine  event, 

To  which  the  whole  creation  moves." 

That  "Divine  event"  is  for  us,  today,  an  enlightened, 
ennobled  humanity. 

AS  A  VOICE  FOR  SIMPLICITY 

We  make  mystery  where  there  is  none.  All  truth  is 
simple  and  easy  to  get  at.  We  are  our  own  obstacles  by 
the  shackles  of  formality  and  needless  dogma  with  which 
we  bind  and  blind  ourselves.  This  is  the  superlative  fault 
of  ages  and  races.  Books  and  rituals,  persons  and  offerings, 
names  and  symbols,  have  been  continually  piled  in  the 
seeker's  way.  Over  these  none  but  the  mighty  can  climb; 
or  better,  only  the  wise  and  strong  can  know  and  refuse  them 
as  useless.  But  those  who  do  not  understand  do  not  know 
that  it  is  understanding  that  is  the  way  to  grace.  These 
must  be  helped  to  that  understanding.  This  can  the  preach- 
er do,  not  by  elaborate  formalities  but  by  going  to  the  people 
with  his  high  personal  grasp  and  experience.  Nor  must 
they  be  allowed  to  follow  or  to  be  led.  They  must  be  taught 
to  see  and  do  by  being  inspired  to  try.  Thus  only  can 
they  learn  what  they  term  the  "real  God"  and  the  "ever- 
present  revelation," 

This  is  men's  greatest  need:  to  realize  that  their  God  did 
not  write  a  letter  to  their  forefathers  ages  ago  and  then  go 
off  and  leave  the  world,  but  that  the  same  Power  is  here, 
now,  in  their  organisms — the  law  of  things.     So  "infidel" 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  149 

have  so-called  religious  people  become  that  it  would  cause 
them  fright  to  realize  suddenly  that  their  "King  of  Heaven" 
is  in  their  own  household.  Oh,  the  misconceptions !  And 
who  is  to  blame?  Surely,  more  priest  than  people.  Those 
"men  of  God"  who  are  men  of  God,  who  have  really  seen 
and  "communed  with  the  Most  High,"  are  full  of  longing 
that  others  might  enjoy  the  "beatific  vision."  They  have 
a  message.     Seers  only  can  say. 

This  sounds  mysterious,  just  because  truth  always  sounds 
mysterious  to  those  who  are  not  only  ignorant  of  it,  but 
worse,  who  are  in  ignorant  moods  about  it.  We  find  it 
difficult  because  the  plain  reality  has  been  hedged  round 
with  doctrine  and  form  and  ancient  interpretation.  The 
preacher  who  conceives  the  "way  to  God"  lies  through  these, 
has  not  been  "called  of  God."  To  quote  the  "Seer  of  Con- 
cord" :  "The  man  who  aims  to  speak  as  books  enable,  as 
synods  use,  as  the  fashion  guides,  as  interest  commands, 
babbles.     Let  him  hush."* 


NEW   GROUNDS   FOR  A  BETTER  FAITH 

Faith  is  never  abundant.  Man  is  always  too  ignorant 
and  too  hard  pushed.  Rite  and  outward  form  are  every- 
where. A  few  know  there  is  something  higher  and  yearn 
for  it.  The  mass  are  ever  dissatisfied  and  know  not  why. 
And  the  preachers  who  should  be  their  spiritual  physicians 
are  trying  by  the  most  ingenious  doctrinal  prescriptions  to 
treat  the  moaning.  One  in  a  hundred  sees  that  it  is  a 
famine,  and  a  famine  where  good  is  immeasurably  abundant. 
Scores  are  occupied  with  the  unrealities  of  the  past;  scores 
more  are  preaching  about  the  God  that  was ;  other  scores 
are  calling  on  God  to  come  down  from  Heaven  and  do  this 
or  that ;  and  some  are  scolding  the  people  for  omitting  one 
observance  and  the  other.  Almost  everywhere  there  is  a 
sort  of  shamefacedness  over  this  situation.  Why  are  so 
many  churches  apologizing?     Do  truth  and  virtue  need  to 

'  Cf.  EmerBon'H  Divinity  School  AddresB. 


ISO    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

be  afraid  and  to  ask  to  be  excused  for  daring  to  live?  Nay, 
apology  is  undertaken  only  when  there  is  feeling  of  wrong 
having  been  done. 

In  New  York  only  six  per  cent  of  the  people  are  com- 
municants. And  what  does  this  mean?  Some  one  who 
loved  the  right  said :  "On  Sundays,  it  seems  wicked  to  go 
to  church."  To  this  the  churchman  should  exclaim:  "High 
Heaven!  has  it  come  to  this?  Have  we  lost  our  piety?" 
In  truth,  faith  seems  nearly  defunct.  Worship  has  nearly 
ceased — if  we  count  heads.  We  have  no  new  reverence 
yet  to  take  the  old's  place.  With  no  trust  in  God,  we  make 
gods  of  ourselves.  As  Emerson  says.  Talent  goes  into 
politics  and  commerce.  Even  in  science  and  literature,  the 
talented  investigate  and  write  to  order  for  pay.  The  ancient 
condition  is  repeated:  "My  people  knoweth  not  God." 

These  things  are  truer  today  than  when  Emerson  wrote 
in  similar  strain. 

THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER'S  TASK 

Thus  to  know  and  see  these  things,  and  to  portray  them  to 
the  people  are  the  chief  business  of  the  preacher  today. 
If  he  do  this  he  will  be  a  busy  man — too  busy  to  deal  in 
negations,  too  busy  to  say  much  against  the  old.  Indeed, 
if  the  people  have  the  "old  views,"  they  will  cling  to  them 
till  they  get  something  else.  Only  positive  work  will  change 
these.  If  they  have  gotten  beyond  these,  then  surely  they  do 
not  need  to  hear  them  preached  against.  Let  the  preacher 
talk  constructively.  Let  him  ignore  the  old  intellectual 
errors,  and  in  the  flood  of  facts  which  he  pours  forth  they 
will  be  washed  away.  Polemic  never  convinces.  It  only 
begets  its  kind. 

Let  the  preacher  now  take  his  people  to  explore  the  other 
faiths  of  the  world.  By  this  intellectual  travel  they  will  be 
enlarged.  Such  expeditions  of  investigation  will  open  up 
to  them  the  tremendous  scope  and  depth  of  man's  religious 
sense.  There  is  much  that  he  can  take  them  to  see  in  their 
own  religious  realm, — the  history  of  their  Bible,  the  Jewish 


THE  NEW-TIME  PREACHER  151 

people,  the  influence  whicli  Judaism  received  from  Eijypt, 
Babylon,  Persia,  Greece,  etc.,  and  the  elements  which 
worked  to  found  Christianity  and  make  it  what  it  has  been 
historically.  By  telling  them  what  the  Bible  is,  he  might 
be  saved  from  the  thankless  task  of  telling  them  what  is  is 
not. 

Even  more  important  is  his  work  in  showing  them 
through  Popular  Science  the  inestimable  value  of  the  study 
of  Nature.  It  is  life  now  that  they  must  live,  and  to  live 
it  they  must  know  the  Eternal  Power  and  the  laws  of  the 
Infinite  Realms.  The  preacher's  work  will  be  of  incalcul- 
able benefit  if  he  foster  a  love  for  the  various  fields  of 
Science,  which  is  "the  book  of  the  law"  today. 

HIS  RELATIVE  POSITION 

As  a  method  of  reaching  the  popular  heart  with  facts  for 
intellectual  conviction,  with  inspiration  for  moral  action, 
with  reverence  for  natural  and  eternal  law,  the  weekly 
Sunday  pulpit  has  had  no  equal,  and  no  rival  before  the 
(lays  of  the  cheap  periodical  and  the  moving  picture. 

The  school  has  long  since  taken  the  primary  details  of  this 
work  to  itself.  But  this  has  raised  the  possible  work  of  the 
pulpit  to  a  higher  place.  There  is  even  greater  need  than 
ever  of  the  most  earnest,  honest,  and  highly  cultured  sum- 
maries of  scientific  knowledge  on  the  great  phases  of  human 
life. 

Again,  the  force  nf  social  orgamcation  as  represented  in 
the  pulpit  as  a  center,  has  no  suhstifufe  as  a  humanizing 
power.  Our  political  democracy  is  to  some  extent  a  help 
toward  this,  yet  the  transient  character  of  the  meetings  and 
to  a  great  extent  of  the  subjects,  but  il!  adapts  this  to  meet 
the  deepest  needs. 

Only  around  the  broader,  deeper  understanding  of  man's 
eternal  relations  to  Nature  and  to  his  kind,  do  the  feelings 
of  reverence  and  sympathy  thrive  best.  This  finds  one  of 
its  best  agencies  in  the  pulpit,  if  the  pulpit  possesses  the 
virtue  of  simplicity.     It  belongs  to  the  ideal  types  of  char- 


152    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

acter  in  different  ages  to  furnish  the  substance-matter  for 
the  creeds  or  beliefs  of  those  ages.  In  the  ancient  world 
it  was  the  Prophet ;  in  the  early  Christian  and  Middle  Age 
times,  the  Saint ;  in  our  day,  the  Scientist,  who  furnishes 
the  articles  for  the  creeds, — while  the  Pulpit  in  each  age 
through  priest,  preacher,  lecturer,  disseminates  the  doctrines 
and  exhorts  to  their  consequent  duties. 

By  departing  from  this,  the  Church  and  Clergy  have 
ruined  their  reputation  as  advocates  of  truth.  Among 
serious  men  of  unbiased  Science  there  prevails  a  suspicion 
of  "clerical  science."  They  have  also  together  discredited 
religion,  so  that  the  honest  world  has  its  doubts  about  it. 
People  do  not  know  that  religion  can  be  re-defined,  and 
hence  millions  are  "done  with  it." 

It  is  evident  that  such  a  mission  as  here  described  can  be 
carried  out  only  by  pulpits  freed  from  dogmatic  trammels. 
It  requires  but  the  same  simple  use  of  power  in  the  workers 
of  today  which  made  the  now  old  gospel  when  new  take  hold 
upon  men.  It  is  this  essence  at  which  an  occasional  preach- 
er is  now  aiming.  It  is  that  simplicity  which  is  at  the  same 
time  insight,  breadth,  and  fearless  earnestness.  It  has 
characterized  the  work  of  all  imperial  religious  workers. 


PART  THREE 
THE   AUTHORITY    OF   FORMER   TIMES 


CHAPTER  xn 

BEAUTIES  OF  THE  OLD  BIBLE 

"It  is  not  easy  to  define  the  popular  theory  of  the  Bible.  Like 
its  kindred  theory  of  Papal  infallibility,  it  is  a  true  chameleon, 
changing  constantly  in  different  minds,  always  denying  the  ab- 
surdity of  which  it  is  made  the  synonym,  ever  qualifying  itself 
safely  yet  never  ceasing  to  take  on  a  vaguely  miraculous  char- 
acter. Various  theories  are  given  in  the  books  in  which  theo- 
logical students  are  mis-educated,  all  of  which  unite  in  claiming 
that  which  they  cannot  agree  in  defending." 

REV.  R.  HEBER  NEWTON,  D.  D. 

The  Bible  as  a  whole  is  ancient  literature,  and  the  world 
must  sooner  or  later  learn  to  treat  it  as  such.  It  is  not  a 
book,  but  a  library  bound  together.  In  every  library  are 
some  good  books,  and  some  trash.  In  every  good  book  are 
some  true  and  beautiful  things,  and  some  things  neither  true 
nor  beautiful. 

In  this  manner,  then,  let  us  look  through  the  ancient 
Jewish-Christian  library — looking  in  this  chapter  only  for 
the  best  features.  We  shall  need  to  bear  in  mind  the  fact 
that  modern  hands  have  wrought  a  part  of  the  final  effort, 
that  it  comes  to  us  not  as  an  ancient  book  entirely. 

153 


154     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 


RECENTLY   ADDED  BEAUTIES 

1.  The  first  beauty  which  attracts  us  is  the  cleijant 
exterior  of  embossed  calf  and  gilt  edges.  But  this  is  recent 
art  and  a  modern  veneer,  and  is  only  an  evidence  of  present 
appreciation,  something  which  may  arise  out  of  intelligent 
understanding,  out  of  ignorant  traditionalism,  or  out  of  pure 
bibliomaniac  sentimentalism.  Hence  this  is  not  the  beauty 
we  seek. 

2.  We  open  the  lids  and  we  are  struck  with  the  exquisite 
print,  and  as  lovers  of  artistic  work,  we  are  pleased.  But 
this  is  wholly  a  modern  invention  and  the  outcome  of  modern 
scientific  study  and  appliances. 

3.  We  turn  a  few  leaves  and  (if  it  is  a  large  Bible)  we 
meet  with  bold  fine  engravings  from  works  of  Dore  and 
others.  These  works  of  art  charm  us,  and  we  exclaim, 
"How  beautiful!"  But  here  again  we  are  dealing  with 
something  utterly  misleading,  something  which  has  nothing 
to  do  with  the  biblical  narratives  but  only  with  the  artists' 
imaginations,  which  were  fired  by  their  dogmatic  religious 
zeal.  As  pictures,  apart  from  the  text,  they  may  be  beau- 
tiful, but  they  do  not  come  down  from  the  olden  time, 
and  are  no  part  of  the  book  itself. 

4.  Over  the  pages,  at  the  heads  of  chapters,  at  the  end 
of  the  volume,  and  elsewhere,  we  find  elaborate  explanations 
of  subjects  and  dates;  concordances  and  dictionaries  re- 
ferring and  defining;  maps,  charts,  and  tablets;  histories  and 
biographies  in  profusion ;  and  we  exclaim,  "How  fine !" 
But  here,  again,  we  must  bethink  ourselves.  These,  too, 
are  no  part  of  the  ancient  literature.  They  are  the  outcome 
of  modern  devotion,  and  would  only  be  helpful  toward  the 
understanding  of  the  ancient  thought,  if  they  were  true. 
Alas,  like  the  art  before  mentioned  they  are  largely  the 
outcome  of  enthusiasm  working  under  prejudice.  Not  the 
half  of  them  are  more  than  ingenious  insinuations  of  a 
certain  scheme  of  interpretation. 

5.  We  turn  to  some  book  which  we  would  read  and  we 
observe,  "Why,  it  is  all  divided  off  into  little  paragraphs 


BEAUTIES  OF  THE  OLD  BIBLE  155 

(verses)  and  chapters,  and  they  are  all  numbered.  How 
queer!  It  must  be  awfully  handy!"  But  this,  too,  is 
modern  (1551).  Is  it  handy?  Perhaps  so,  to  get  "proof 
texts"  for  authoritative  quoting.  We  begin  to  read.  We 
find  it  checks  the  thought.  The  natural  flow  which  we  are 
accustomed  to  in  other  books  is  gone.  The  "verse-making 
machine"  has  chopped  it  up  into  short  artificial  sentences, 
which  are  not  the  natural  pauses.  The  sense  is  made  harder 
to  obtain.  W'e  turn  over  to  another  place,  and  we  find  the 
poetry  has  been  printed  as  prose.  Its  rhythm  is  spoiled  and 
its  nature  concealed.  In  another  part,  we  find  the  dramatic 
character  has  been  blotted  out  by  this  childish,  arbitrary 
verse-making  process.  Hence  this  feature  too  is  a  false 
and  unreal  beauty. 

6.  The  language  next  attracts  our  notice.  //  is  Old 
English.  There  is  in  it  an  agreeable  quaintness.  Much  of 
it  we  enjoy.  In  places  it  is  powerful,  smooth,  melodious. 
And  we  go  on  with  much  enjoyment,  until  the  thought  comes 
over  us  that  we  are  perhaps  not  getting  the  full  meaning  of 
the  originals  through  this  less  ancient  medium.  We  wonder 
if  the  King  James  Translators  understood  it.  We  think  of 
the  vast  researches  of  modern  historical  criticism,  and  we 
become  convinced  that  they  did  not.  Moreover,  we  also 
become  convinced  that  we  do  not  fully  understand  the  Old 
English.  And  altogether  the  beauty  of  diction  turns  out  to 
be  a  beauty  in  which  we  cannot  trust.  It  is  more  or  less 
an  unreal  beauty,  and  as  such  we  do  not  enjoy  it  unalloyed. 
Rut  there  are  other  translations.  We  take  up  the  "Revised 
Version,"  and  again  turn  over  the  pages. 

RFAL    AND   DEKPKR    BKAUTIF.S 

Overlooking  all  these  veneers  (meant  for  beauty  and  of 
mDclern  origin),  we  begin  to  read. 

I.  Perhaps  the  first  thing  that  we  next  observe  is  the 
extreme  earnestness  everywhere  met.  A  rare  zeal  is  found 
on  many  pages.  The  writers  speak  with  a  profound  convic- 
tion of  the  truth  of  what  they  say  and  of  the  moral  import- 


156    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

ance  of  it.  The  themes  are  mostly  moral  and  religious;  or, 
at  least,  everything  is  for  religious  ends.  The  spirit  of 
devotion  to  an  all-devouring  cause  possesses  them  all.  The 
more  we  read,  the  more  we  are  captivated  with  this.  It  is 
an  infrequent  sort  of  life.  We  can  only  match  this  charac- 
teristic by  few  instances  in  the  history  of  any  literature. 
Most  writers  are  cold  in  comparison.  Here  is  a  feeling  of 
the  warmest  service  to  God  in  the  most  unquestioned  confi- 
dence of  its  necessity  for  human  life.  We  admire  it,  and 
we  do  so  without  qualification,  even  when  we  most  funda- 
mentally dissent  from  the  positions  taken  by  the  authors. 
In  them  we  find  the  purest  patriotism  and  the  keenest 
religious  feeling.  It  is  a  beauty  that  atones  for  many  errors 
of  judgment.  It  grows  in  later  times  to  a  greater  breadth. 
In  the  spirit  of  Jesus  it  broadens  into  an  anxiety  and  interest 
for  all  humanity.  Indeed,  it  is  this  very  essence  that  has 
given  it  its  influence  in  the  world.  It  was  this  beautiful 
zeal  for  good  that  took  the  ancient  Judaism  out  of  its  ex- 
clusiveness  into  the  inclusiveness  of  Jesuism.  In  this  the 
Jewish  thought  reaches  its  climax. 

2.  Next,  in  natural  order,  we  observe  the  worshipful 
feature  that  is  predominant  in  many  portions.  It  is  more 
formal  in  the  histories  and  books  of  the  law,  more  spiritful 
in  the  Psalms,  Prophets,  and  New  Testament.  It  is  wholly 
absent  in  a  few — Esther,  Ecclesiastes,  and  so  forth.  In  the 
better  Psalms  it  reaches  a  degree  of  exaltation  and  purity 
which  has  served  as  a  model  for  pious  souls  during  2000 
years.  It  is  of  many  grades,  from  the  calm  trust  of  the 
twenty-third  Psalm  to  the  tumultuous  rapture  of  Isaiah 
forty-ninth.  The  first — the  comfort  of  the  centuries  for 
resigned  and  obedient  spirits: 

"The  Lord  is  my  shepherd; 

I  shall  not  want. 

He  maketh  me  to  lie  down  in  green  pastures; 

He  leadeth  me  beside  the  still  waters. 

He  restoreth  my  soul; 

He  leadeth  me  in  the  paths  of  righteousness  for  his  name's  sake. 


BEAUTIES  OF  THE  OLD  BIBLE  157 

Yea,  though  I  walk  through  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death, 

I  will  fear  no  evil: 

For  thou  art  with  me; 

Thy  rod  and  thy  staff  they  comfort  me. 

Surely  goodness  and  mercy  shall  follow  me  all  the  days  of  my  life: 

And  I  will  dwell  in  the  house  of  the  Lord  forever." 

And  the  exultant  confidence  of  Isaiah  (ch.  4p  verse  1$) : 

"Sing,   O  Heavens;    and   be  joyful,   O  Earth; 
And  break  forth   into   singing,   O   Mountains. 
For  the  Lord  hath  comforted  his  people; 
And  will  have  mercy  upon  his  afflicted." 

Or  again,  hear  the  confident  exhortation  of  the  sixty-sixth 
Psalm: 

"Make  a  joyful  noise  unto  God, 
All  ye  lands: 

Sing  forth  the  honor  of  his  name: 
Make  his  praise  glorious." 

In  the  Psalms  the  worshipful  is,  of  course,  the  burden  of 
thought.  But  they  are  very  unequal  in  value.  The  great 
majority  breathe  a  lofty  and  pure  spirit.  All  of  them  are 
earnest,  while  a  few  of  them  are  examples  of  the  narrowest 
and  most  vindictive  temper.  The  Psalter  is  the  poetical 
religious  flowering  of  several  centuries  of  writers,  and  has 
served  as  a  liturgy  during  the  twenty  less  original  ones 
succeeding  them. 

3.  Perhaps  the  next  feature  which  attracts  us  is  that  of 
the  numerous  and  sagacious  practical  sayings.  There  is  a 
considerable  amount  of  sound  human  experience  stored  up 
in  its  collections  of  proverbial  wisdom.  These  are  often 
terse  and  beautiful.  The  book  of  Proverbs  consists  of  little 
else.  While  Job,  Ecclesiastes,  and  many  of  the  sayings 
ascribed  to  Jesus  furnish  numerous  examples.  (Still  others 
equally  good  are  found  in  the  Apocryphal  books  of  Ecclesi- 
asticus  and  Wisdom  of  Solomon.) 


158    A   RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

"Iron  sharpeneth  iron;  so  a  man  sharpeneth  the  countenance 
of  his  friend." 

"A  fool  uttereth  all  his  mind;  but  a  wise  man  keepeth  it  in 
till  afterwards." 

"Go  to  the  ant  thou  sluggard;  consider  her  ways,  and  be  wise." 

"There  is  that  scattereth,  and  yet  increaseth;  and  there  is 
that  withholdeth  more  than  is  meet,  but  it  tendeth  to  poverty." 

"Righteousness  exalteth  a  nation;  but  sin  is  a  reproach  to  any 
people." 

"A  soft  answer  turneth  away  wrath;  but  grievous  words  stir 
up  anger." 

"Betier  is  a  dinner  of  herbs  where  love  is,  than  a  stalled  ox 
and  hatred  therewith." 

"Pride  goeth  before  destruction,  and  a  haughty  spirit  before  a 
fall." 

"A  good  name  is  rather  to  be  chosen  than  great  riches,  and 
loving  favor  rather  than  silver  and  gold." 

"Train  up  a  child  in  the  way  he  should  go;  and  when  he  is 
old,  he  will  not  depart  from  it." 

"Let  another  man  praise  thee,  and  not  thine  own  mouth;  a 
stranger  and  not  thine  own  lips." 

"The  wicked  flee  when  no  man  pursueth;  but  the  righteous 
are  bold  as  a  lion." 

These  nuts  of  wisdom  might  be  multiplied  by  hundreds. 
Surely  we  are  grateful  to  the  old  scribes  who  collected  them 
and  passed  them  on  to  the  later  centuries.  We  can  only 
regret  that  stupid  imitators  should  have  palmed  them  off 
on  a  yet  stupider  world  as  the  assumed  wisdom  of  an  almost 
unknown  man,  Solomon,  and  one  who  so  far  as  known  bore 
no  likeness  to  the  wise  and  righteous  character  shining  from 
these  composite  sayings,  gradually  originating  during  many 
ages  preceding  their  collection. 

4.  We  can  but  admire  the  Decalogue  of  "nots"  found  in 
Exodus  (XX)  and  dating  from  the  early  social  beginnings 
of  Israelitish  People.  But  the  beauty  of  these  is  insignifi- 
cant when  compared  with  that  of  the  teachings  in  the 
positive  Beatitudes  of  Jesus  (Matt.  V).  Instead  of  the 
string  of  prohibitives  found  in  most  of  the  early  Jewish 
morals,  we  find  here  the  positive  life  held  up  to  view.  It 
is  not  any  longer  what  a  man  does  not  do  that  makes  him 
righteous,  but  virtue  has  grown  to  consist  in  the  actual  doing 
of  the  positively  good.     He  who  is  engaged  in  good-doing 


BEAUTIES  OF  THE  OLD  BIBLE  159 

needs  not  be  told  what  he  shall  do.  Good-doing  precludes 
bad-doing.  The  bad  has  no  longer  any  chance  where  the 
good  fills  the  moral  horizon.  In  these  Beatitudes  are  roots 
of  a  higher  life  of  humanity.  Probably  the  idea  of  a  life 
positive  in  goodness  was  proposed  and  illustrated  with  some- 
thing of  fullness  for  the  first  time  in  Jewish  history  by 
Jesus.  Hence  we  find  here  a  moral  beauty  that  has  no 
complete  parallel  in  olden  times.  Though  it  was  scarcely 
ever  well  understood,  it  has  given  an  ethical  impetus  to 
civilization  that  has  been  growing  in  force  as  the  centuries 
have  rolled  away,  and  has  now  an  embodiment  in  hundreds 
of  heroic  workers. 

5.  One  of  the  beauties  in  this  Literature-Book — and  one 
which  for  some  time  yet  will  be  but  little  appreciated — is 
its  wealth  of  inspiring  legend  and  story.  So  long  as  these 
are  ignorantly  regared  as  history,  they  will  not  fulfill  their 
mission  of  folk-lore  and  illustration.  Scores  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament narratives  are  but  myth,  legend,  and  folk-tales  handed 
down  for  generations.  When  so  regarded,  they  offer  food 
for  thought  and  instruction.  When  taken  literally,  they  are 
absurd  and  impossible  narratives  serving  only  as  bones  of 
contention  among  ignorant  and  dogmatic  people.  So,  many 
of  the  illustrative  stories  (Jonah,  Song  of  Songs,  and  so 
forth)  and  parables  (especially  in  the  Gospels)  are  ideals  of 
absurdity  when  assumed  as  history ;  but  become  strong,  use- 
ful, moral  and  religious  lessons  or  problems,  if  taken  as 
oriental  figures.  (E.  g.,  Dives  and  Lazarus,  Prodigal  Son, 
Talents,  Ten  Virgins,  Good  Samaritan,  and  so  forth). 
Even  then  we  need  not — and  do  not — always  agree  with 
them  in  order  to  find  them  beautiful. 

6.  Lastly,  I  must  point  out  one  more  moral  beauty,  viz., 
that  many  writers  of  the  Bible  (though  not  all  of  them) 
array  themselves  on  the  side  of  the  pour  and  oppressed.  In 
Leviticus  (XXV)  is  a  beautiful  scheme  for  their  ultimate 
relief.  It  is  the  Jubilee- Year  solution  of  the  "land  prob- 
lem," and  is  to  be  greatly  commended  for  its  attempt  and  its 
practical  character  in  its  own  times.  Then  in  many  of  the 
Psalms,  in  Proverbs,  in  some  of  the  Prophets,  and  in  the 


i6o    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

biographies  of  Jesus,  the  spirit  of  sympathy  predominates. 
In  other  parts  of  the  Pentateuch,  in  the  older  historic  books, 
and  in  the  writin^js  of  Paul,  the  past  barbarities  of  slavery 
and  the  present  inhuman  wage  slavery  find  a  traditional 
support  and  sanction.  In  these,  sin  is  less  the  condition  of 
the  heart  and  more  an  absence  of  ceremonialism  or  of  belief 
in  dogma.  Thus  they  authoritatively  make  continuance  in 
wrong-doing  possible,  and  assume  to  justify  life  by  other 
means  than  righteousness. 

Thus,  if  we  give  the  Biblical  literature  its  due,  it  has 
beauties  many.  Make  it  an  authority,  assume  in  it  a  false 
unity,  and  we  damn  it  to  worse  than  uselessness.  It  posi- 
tively becomes  a  means  of  arresting  development.  Not  till 
we  take  the  books  alone  or  bound  in  natural  groups,  shall 
we  do  them  justice  and  benefit  the  world  with  them.  As  it 
stands,  the  "Authorized  Version"  is  the  worst  hindrance 
now  menacing  civilization.  Taken  intelligently,  human 
progress  can  find  in  the  past  no  ally  so  helpful  as  the  Jewish 
moral  and  religious  idealists.  The  Bible  is  a  most  unequal 
literature.  Unbind  the  books  ;  unbind  reason  ;  use  the  latter 
upon  the  former;  and  then  we  shall  be  able  to  know  good 
from  evil.  There  is  no  substitute  for  reason.  Truth,  like 
precious  metals,  is  seldom  found  native.  With  reason  we 
must  smelt  the  ores  of  tradition  and  dogma  before  we 
separate  the  moral  and  religious  beauties  from  the  dross 
of  ignorance  and  superstition. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
WHY  PREACH  ABOUT  THE  BIBLE? 

1.  Because  most  preachers  do  not.  They  generally 
preach  from  it,  not  about  it.  Hence,  people  as  a  rule  do 
not  know  its  nature,  origin,  history,  changes,  truths,  errors, 
values,  and  so  forth. 

Preachers  assume  it  divine,  infallible.  This  has  been 
practiced  for  many  centuries.  The  consequence  is  that  in- 
vestigation has  been  forestalled  and  the  errors  have  become 
as  sacredly  preserved  as  the  truths.  Preaching  from  it  is 
called  "textual  literalism";  preaching  about  it,  "higher 
criticism", 

2.  Because  hundreds  and  thousands  of  new  facts  have 
been  discovered  about  the  Bible  and  about  the  things  it 
treats,  which  the  people  have  a  right  to  know  and  which 
the  people  ought  to  know ;  e.  g.,  that  the  books  usually 
ascribed  to  Moses  are  the  work  of  several  authors  long 
after  his  time,  and  that  these  were  edited  and  fused  into 
the  form  of  a  single  history  about  the  middle  of  the  fifth 
century  B.  C. — looo  years  after  the  date  the  Church  has 
mistakenly  assigned  for  Moses'  death!  145 1  B.  C.  For 
example,  the  book  named  "Isaiah"  is  from  two  principal  and 
several  minor  sources.  The  "Psalms  of  David"  are  hymns 
composed  during  several  centuries,  very  few,  if  any,  having 
been  sung  by  David.  The  same  is  true  of  the  "Proverbs 
of  Solomon."  'i'he  book  of  "Daniel"  was  written  165  B.  C, 
400  years  after  Daniel's  time!  Not  one  of  the  "Gospels" 
was  written  by  the  disciples  and  apostles  whose  names  are 
now  attached  to  them,  but  they  are  in  their  present  forms 
the  products  of  the  second  century  A.  D.,  from  70  to  150 

161 


i62    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

years  after  the  death  of  Jesus!  Several  of  the  Epistles 
(Eph.,  Titus,  I  &  II  Tim.,  I,  II,  III  John,  II  Pet.)  are 
forgeries  of  the  2nd  century  ascribed  to  Paul,  John,  and 
Peter  in  order  to  give  them  greater  authority.  The  unity 
of  Biblical  theory  is  an  assumed  and  not  a  real  one,  and 
there  are  numerous  errors  and  contradictions  in  historical 
and  doctrinal  statements. 

3.  Because  the  real  value  and  the  proper  use  of  the  Bible 
is  obscured  or  totally  lost  by  these  gross  misconceptions  of 
its  origin,  nature  and  character.  It  is  probably  the  most 
interesting  collection  of  ancient  religious  records  that  could 
be  made.  But  the  most  interesting  and  valuable  features 
are  not  apparent  while  it  is  so  wholly  misunderstood.  Its 
nature  as  a  record  of  developing  monotheism  and  ancient 
higher  ethical  feeling  is  lost  to  those  who  learn  it  by  rote 
and  hold  it  as  an  authority  to  be  consulted. 

4.  Because  much  of  its  teaching  is  superseded,  and 
people  generally  do  not  see  why.  They  do  not  realize  that 
in  taking  the  Bible  statements  about  God,  creation,  man,  sin, 
right,  duty,  reconciliation,  punishment,  future,  and  so  forth 
they  are  accepting  theories  from  1700  to  3000  years  old,  and 
that  this  ignores  the  experience  and  investigations  of  all  the 
later,  and  of  this  most  enlightened  of  the  ages.  On  all  these 
topics  the  Bible  views  are  nearly  always  relatively  primitive. 
They  were  the  thoughts  of  minds,  for  the  most  part,  very 
poorly  informed  or  utterly  uninformed  as  to  the  things  they 
wrote  about. 

About  God,  it  is  doubtful  whether  half  a  dozen  Bible 
passages  can  be  cited  which  would  bear  the  light  of  modern 
facts  in  a  comparison.  Some  New  Testament  statements 
approach  the  higher  conception  of  today,  but  as  a  whole 
the  Biblical  ideas  of  God  are  anthropomorphic.  They 
neither  describe  the  nature  or  character  of  the  Infinite  and 
Eternal  Spirit-Energy  known  to  us  through  the  discoveries 
of  that  Science  which  the  Church  still  steadily  opposes. 

About  Creation,  the  Bible  statements  are  puerile,  and  the 
Bible  assumptions  are  (with  very  few  exceptions)  false. 
There  was  no  "beginning"  and  God  never  "created"  any- 


WHY  PREACH  ABOUT  THE  BIBLE?        163 

thing.  God  evolves.  All  things  and  all  worlds  are  the 
manifestations  of  His  infinite  active  nature.  And  Man  is 
no  exception.  He,  too,  is  a  product  of  the  world  <jrowth. 
He  never  experienced  a  Fall.  His  progress,  like  the  rest 
of  nature,  is  steadily  on.  Sin  was  not  a  lapse.  It  is  and 
always  has  been  merely  a  failure  to  go  forward  voluntarily 
to  make  progress,  to  work  for  the  higher  ideal.  The  Bible 
teaching  about  it  is  utterly  inadequate.  God  does  not  rule 
man  by  the  "moral  government"  theory.  Reconciliation  to 
God  is  not  accomplished  by  "believhig  on  his  Son  Jesus 
Christ."  Belief  does  not  elevate  life.  This  is  done  by 
understanding,  and  by  living  up  to  the  laws  of  life.  There 
is  no  reconciliation  with  law  once  violated.  And  for  this 
the  "punishment"  or  rather  the  consequence  is  not  put  ofif 
to  some  "future  state."  It  begins  at  once,  and  from  it  there 
is  no  escape.  The  real  "God"  is  not  appeased  by  blood — 
even  though  it  be  that  of  the  so-called  "only  begotten  Son 
of  God."  The  "Final  Judgment"  is  pronounced  in  the 
violation  of  every  law.     It  is  going  on  all  the  time. 

Hence,  the  common  assumptions  based  on  the  Bible  doc- 
trines are  unjustified.  Many  of  these  assumptions  are  ab- 
solutely at  variance  with  demonstrated  truths  of  Science, 
and  others  must  be  qualified  by  a  belter  understanding. 

5.  Because  the  attitude  of  deferring  to  Bible  authority 
kept  the  western  world  in  barbarism  for  over  1000  years 
(approximately  from  400  to  1500  A.  D.).  And  it  emerges 
therefrom  only  so  fast  as  it  throws  ofi^  this  authority.  The 
age  of  really  great  progress  from  1430  till  today  is  limited 
to  the  period  of  the  criticism  of  that  very  authority  which 
before  kept  men  bowing  superstiiiously  to  the  dictates  of  a 
so-called  "Word  of  God."  In  proportion  to  the  thorough- 
ness of  the  opposition  to  it  there  has  been  genuine  human 
progress.  The  Renaissance  was  a  revolt.  All  modern 
physical  science  has  been  a  progressive  fundamental  denial 
of  the  Biblical  and  Ecclesiastic  views.  In  the  middle  of 
the  eighteenth  century  the  scientific  spirit  entered  the  field  of 
Biblical  history,  and  since  the  work  done  by  A.struc  (1753) 
the  world  has  been  very  largely  set  free,  so  far  as  it  knew 


i64    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

it,  from  the  spell  of  unquestioning  credulity.  A  long  line 
of  noble  workers  in  the  field  of  "Higher  Criticism"  has 
enriched  the  world  with  a  vast  amount  of  most  valuable 
knowledge. 

6.  Because  by  this  Bible  authority  and  assumptions  of 
divine  and  completed  truth,  the  Church  has  set  itself  in 
opposition  to  every  discovery  regarding  Nature.  It  denietl 
the  possibility  of  another  half  to  the  world  and  scoffed  at 
the  undertaking  of  Columbus.  It  paid  no  attention  at  first 
(for  nearly  a  hundred  years)  to  Copernicus' s  great  discovery 
of  the  solar  system  and  the  earth's  true  place,  and  after- 
wards condemned  his  book  and  kept  it  on  the  "Index." 
It  denied  the  results  of  Galileo's  work  with  the  telescope 
in  finding  moons  for  Jupiter,  phases  for  Venus,  mountains 
on  our  moon,  and  other  worlds  than  ours ;  as  well  as  his 
discoveries  regarding  the  natural  laws  of  falling  bodies  and 
of  pendulums.  It  refused  to  accept  Newton's  discoveries 
regarding  the  great  law  of  gravitation  and  the  consequences 
or  corrollaries  of  causality  resulting  from  it.  It  denied 
Arduino's  discovery  and  Buffon's  and  Humboldfs  explana- 
tion of  the  stratified  condition  of  the  earth's  crust;  and  to 
this  day,  it  remains  ignorant  of  and  does  not  accept  the 
now  secure  science  of  Geology.  It  has  ridiculed  and  perse- 
cuted every  biologist  from  Erasmus  Darzvin  and  Lamarck 
down  to  Charles  Darzvin,  Huxley  and  Spencer,  and  though 
they  have  triumphantly  established  the  sufficiency  of  natural 
forces  in  accounting  for  all  the  varieties  of  life,  yet  it 
wilfully  preaches  to  the  ignorant  people  that  they  were 
"created  in  the  image  of  God."  It  will  not  see  that  the 
infinite  pervasive  Spirit  cannot  have  an  "image"  and  conse- 
quently never  "makes"  or  "creates."  Again,  it  persistently 
(lenies,  on  Bible  authority,  the  incontrovertible  evidence 
from  Geology  and  Archaeology  of  the  vast  age  of  man  on 
the  globe ;  while  it  anathematizes  as  "infidels"  and  "atheists" 
such  truthseekers  of  the  world's  first  rank  as  Lyell,  Boucher 
de  Perthes,  Keith,  and  Osborne.  It  has  scarcely  yet  yielded 
its  age-long  doctrine  that  lightning  and  thunder  are  the 
vengeful    instruments    of    a   man-like    sky-God,   or   of   the 


WHY  PREACH  ABOUT  THE  BIBLE?         165 

"Prince  of  the  power  of  the  air:"  while  for  many  decades 
after  Franklin's  discoveiy  of  this  natural  and  now  indis- 
pensible  force,  it  refused  to  "fly  in  the  face  of  Providence" 
by  putting  lightning-rods  on  its  churches!  At  the  same 
time,  inside  of  those  churches,  with  ignorant  zeal  it  referred 
to  this  splendid  human  benefactor,  Franklin,  as  an  "arch- 
infidel." 

But  the  instances  are  too  numerous  to  cite.  From  every 
F.eld  of  Science  there  is  found  a  like  record.  I  know  of  no 
great  discovery,  no  new-found  truth  of  far-reaching  conse- 
quence that  has  not  been  despised  and  resisted  by  the  Church 
that  rests  on  Bible  authority.  For  centuries  it  was  an  abso- 
lutely irresistible  barrier  to  progress  in  the  discovery  of 
truth.  Even  now,  though  it  has  received  the  blow  which 
may  prove  fatal,  yet  it  possesses  a  proclivity  for  reversion 
which  stamps  it  as  the  most  deep-seated  evil  of  the  western 
or  Aryan  World. 

7.  Because  very  few  people  believe  it  as  they  think  they 
do.  They  read  it  (so  far  as  they  do  so  at  all)  as  an  au- 
thority. They  assume  its  absolute  reliability  and  expect  its 
commands  to  be  binding.  This  utterly  destroys  all  their 
powers  of  discrimination  as  they  read.  Although  they  are 
personally  far  better  than  much  of  what  they  read,  their 
moral  sense  is  not  affronted  because  they  at  start  have  shut 
out  their  reason.  Let  any  one  of  common  school  education 
honestly  read,  and  think  as  he  reads,  the  stories  of  Noah 
and  the  Flood,  of  Abraham,  Jacob,  Txit,  Moses,  Joshua, 
Samuel,  David,  Solomon,  etc.,  or  let  him  look  up  these 
references:  Deut.  XIV,  21,  XXI,  10-14;  Judg.  Ill,  14-30; 
Ps.  XXXV,  LVIII,  LXIX,  CIX;  E/.ek.  XIV,  9;  Rom, 
XIII,  i;  I  Cor.  XI,  14-15,  XIV,  3s;  Gal.  h  9;  U  Thes. 
II,  11;  I  Tim.  II,  12;  and  I  Pet.  Ill,  t.  Then  let  him 
continue  to  be  honest  while  he  asks  himself,  whether  these 
things,  instead  of  being  the  "Word  of  God,"  do  not  deserve 
his  heartiest  moral  twentieth  century  contempt? 

If  he  already  has  that  moral  contempt  for  these  particular 
things  but  still  holds  to  some  sort  of  wholesale  allegiance 
to  the  volume,  then  has  he  been  contaminated.    lie  is  holding 


i66    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

In  confused  hypocrisy  to  an  authority  which  he  does  not 
respect.  He  is  trying  from  some  poHcy  purpose  to  belong 
to  an  age  which  he  lias  consciously  outgrown.  He  will 
experience  atrophy  of  character  and  manhood  till  he  again 
becomes  true  to  his  moral  reason. 

These  and  a  score  of  other  reasons  explain  why  the 
Church  should  preach  about  the  Bible.  Is  it  not  possible 
for  even  people  of  limited  time  to  take  toward  it  a  rational 
attitude?  Is  it  always  necessary  to  be  more  credulous  and 
stupid  about  religious  things  than  others?  If  it  is  only 
possible  for  us  to  study  the  thoughts  of  one  period  (though 
I  doubt  it),  then  a  thousand  times  better  were  it  to  learn  the 
elements  of  modern  knowledge — of  the  stars  (Astronomy), 
of  the  earth  (Geology),  of  life  (Biology),  of  man  in  general 
(Anthropology),  of  society,  (Sociology  and  Ethics),  and  of 
mind  (Psychology).  From  these  we  have  a  religion  which 
will  keep  us  in  a  hundredfold  more  sacred  nearness  to  God. 
These  are  the  laws  of  God.  These  are  Revelation  at  its 
latest — not  its  primitive  stage.  Know  all  times,  as  far  as  we 
can.  But  whatever  else  we  do,  know  and  live  the  proven 
truths  of  today. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

"HIGHER  CRITICISM" 
"There  is  no  history  but  critical  history." — VON  RANKE. 

History,  till  recently,  was  usually  written  to  embellish. 
Someone,  who  was  strongly  partisan  toward  a  movement, 
a  cause,  a  people,  or  an  individual,  wrote  about  it,  narrated 
its  career  purposely  to  extend  its  fame  or  influence. 
Naturally,  the  writer  omitted  or  polished  out  whatever  was 
derogatory.  Hence,  historians  have  mostly  been  hero- 
worshippers  or  ardent  advocates. 

With  the  oncoming  of  the  spirit  of  Modern  Science  and 
the  consequent  growth  of  a  greater  love  for  the  truth. 
History  is  more  and  more  becoming  a  record  of  facts  un- 
glossed  by  interest  and  prejudice. 

Realizing  this  and  that  earlier  historians  have  impressed 
their  views  of  the  olden  times  until  they  have  become  dogma 
to  the  masses,  it  is  small  wonder  that  the  newer  writers  are 
regarded  as  "audacious  infidels." 

But  it  will  be  interesting  to  know  these  critical  historians 
and  what  they  did.  It  was  surely  daring  to  re-examine 
books  pronounced  "sacred,  holy,  and  infallible"  by  bishops 
so  long  ago  as  the  fourth  Christian  century. 

Let  us  inquire. 

This  "ruthless  profane"  work  seems  to  have  begun  in  the 
middle  of  the  twelfth  century.  Ahen  Ezra  (died  1167) 
doubted  that  Moses  wrote  the  account  of  his  own  death  and 
burial!  (See  Deut.  XXXIV).  But  Aben  said,  "let  him 
who  understands  hold  his  tongue."  This  is  even  yet  con- 
sidered very  "safe  doctrine."  During  the  next  400  years 
all  writers  seem  to  have  held  their  tongues,  whether  they 
understood  or  not. 

167 


i68    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Just  before  the  Protestant  Reformation,  Nicholas  Cusa 
(died  1464)  undertook  to  write  more  critically,  but  only 
aroused  opposition.  After  the  Protestant  rebellion,  Carl- 
siadt  said  that  the  authorship  of  the  Pentateuch  was  un- 
known. But  he  was  soon  suppressed  by  his  co-Protestant 
workers,  the  whole  essence  of  whose  movement  was  an 
appeal  to  the  Bible  as  the  absolute  authority.  Next,  a 
Catholic,  Andreas  Macs,  made  the  astonishing  claim  that 
Ezra  the  Scribe  had  edited  the  Pentateuch  and  given  it  to 
us  in  its  present  form  as  late  as  about  450  B.  C.  The  old 
Church  promptly  put  his  work  on  the  "Index."  Valla, 
Erasmus,  and  the  Scaligers,  in  the  sixteenth  century  made 
many  examinations,  but  accomplished  no  great  results,  save 
the  development  of  a  scholarly  tendency. 

In  the  seventeenth  century,  Hohhes,  the  English  moral 
philosopher,  openly  denied  the  Mosaic  authorship  of  the 
Pentateuch  in  his  great  work  "Leviathan"  (1651).  For  this 
he  lost  his  high  political  standing.  Then  La  Peyrere,  a 
Frenchman,  wrote  a  book  on  "Pre-Adamites."  For  this  he 
was  thrown  into  prison.  The  work  was  "refuted"  by  seven 
churchmen  during  the  first  year,  and  by  thirty-six  others 
during  the  next  fifty  years.  The  Parliament  at  Paris  had  it 
burned  in  public  by  the  common  hangman. 

In  1670,  Spinoza,  the  greatest  of  Dutch  Philosophers, 
published  his  "Tractatus  Theologico-Politicus."  In  it  he 
showed,  as  Dr.  White  sums  it  up,  that  "Moses  could  not 
have  been  the  author  of  the  Pentateuch  in  the  form  then 
existing;  that  there  had  been  glosses  and  revisions;  that  the 
biblical  books  had  grown  up  as  a  literature;  that,  though 
great  truths  are  to  be  found  in  them,  and  they  are  to  be 
regarded  as  a  Divine  revelation,  that  the  old  claims  of 
inerrancy  for  them  cannot  be  maintained ;  that  in  studying 
them  men  had  been  misled  by  mistaking  human  conceptions 
for  Divine  meanings ;  that  while  prophets  have  been  inspired, 
the  prophetic  faculty  has  not  been  the  dowry  of  the  Jewish 
people  alone ;  that  to  look  for  exact  knowledge  of  natural 
and  spiritual  phenomena  in  the  sacred  books  is  an  utter 


"HIGHER  CRITICISM"  169 

mistake."*  He  believed  that  the  Pentateuch  was  written 
long  after  Moses,  though  possibly  Moses  may  have  written 
some  things  in  it.  For  this  most  valuable  service  Spinoza 
was  denounced  as  a  heretic  by  both  Jews  and  Christians. 
He  was  cut  off  from  the  synagogue  with  the  vilest  public 
curse.  Against  all  this  he  showed  no  resentment.  He  lived 
in  retirement,  ground  glass  for  a  living,  and  wrote  books 
for  the  world  which  did  not  know  better  than  to  hate  its 
greatest  benefactors.  The  Church,  ever  since,  has  called 
him  atheist  and  infidel ;  but  minds  greit  enough  to  under- 
stand his  greatness  have  pronounced  him  "a  God-intoxicated 
man"  (Novalis),  and  "a  Saint"  (Schleiermacher). 

Robert  Stcplianus  (1526-59),  of  the  celebrated  publishing 
house  in  Paris,  searched  the  texts  and  found  over  2000 
variations  among  the  oldest  manuscripts  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. 

In  1680  Capcllus  published  his  "Critica  Sacra."  He 
showed  the  modern  date  of  the  Hebrew  vowel  points,  also 
that  the  modern  text  from  which  our  translations  are  made 
has  very  many  errors  due  to  carelessness,  ignorance,  and 
doctrinal  zeal  of  the  copyists. 

In  1680  appeared  Richard  Simon's  "Critical  History  of 
the  Old  Testament."  Simon  was  a  Catholic  and  a  priest 
of  the  Oratory.  He  combined  the  great  qualities  of  an 
acute  scholar,  a  genuine  critic,  and  a  truly  religious  man. 
In  his  book  he  denied  the  Mosaic  authorship  of  the  Penta- 
teuch, showed  that  other  Old  Testament  books  were  com- 
piled from  older  sources,  and  refuted  the  notion  that  Hebrew 
was  the  primitive  language  of  man. 

His  book  passed  the  censor  and  was  printed  in  1678. 
Some  pages  of  the  preface  and  contents  were  shown  to 
Bishop  Bossuet,  who  denounced  it  as  "a  mass  of  impieties 
and  a  bulwark  of  irreligion."  It  at  once  aroused  his  intense 
opposition.  He  rushed  away  (on  Holy  Thursday!)  to  the 
chancellor  and  persuaded  him  to  stop  the  publication  and 


•  Andrfw  D.  Whitfi,  History  of  The  Warfare  of  Science  with 
Theology.    2  Volumes. 


170    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

have  the  edition  Ininil.  A  few  copies,  however,  got  away. 
Two  years  afterwards  a  translation  of  it  was  published  in 
England,  and  it  was  also  published  in  Holland  a  few  years 
later.  For  writing  other  books  of  a  scholarly  and  liberal 
character  Bossuet  succeeded  in  driving  him  from  the 
Oratory. 

Jean  Le  Clerc  (formerly  of  Geneva,  later  of  Amsterdam) 
published  various  works  on  Hebrew  and  on  Scriptural  in- 
terpretation. About  1685  he  introduced  questions  as  to 
Elohim,  the  serpent,  Babel,  Sodom,  Lot's  wife,  the  dividing 
of  the  Red  Sea,  and  so  forth. 

In  1753  a  French  Catholic  physician,  Astruc  gave  to  the 
world  one  of  the  greatest  contributions  to  Biblical  criticism, 
in  a  work  entitled,  "Conjectures  upon  the  original  memoirs 
which  Moses  used  in  composing  the  book  of  Genesis."  He 
detected  the  different  words  used  for  God  (Elohim  and 
Yahweh)  and  found  two  principal  narratives  written  sep- 
arately and  later  fused  together.  Of  course  he  got  no 
credit,  and  was  sneered  at  as  a  heretic  and  an  ignoramus. 
What  could  a  physician  know  about  Hebrew  and  other 
sacred  things!  But  he  proved  his  points,  and  they  have 
remained. 

This  line  was  followed  up  in  1779  by  Eichhorn,  who  did 
much  to  show  the  world  the  great  fact  that  the  Bible  is  not 
a  book  but  a  literature.  Its  style  is  not  supernatural  but 
Oriental,  and  this  in  a  large  degree  accounts  for  its  peculiar 
effect  on  oriental  minds.  From  his  time  the  term  "Higher 
Criticism"  has  been  used  to  describe  this  broader,  larger 
study  and  survey. 

The  German  poet-philosopher,  Herder,  gave  out  in  1782 
his  "Spirit  of  Hebrew  Poetry."  He  showed  that  the  Psalms 
were  from  different  periods  and  by  different  authors. 
Herder  was  probably  the  first  to  dissipate  the  haze  of  mysti- 
cism that  had  for  2chx)  years  hung  round  the  Song  of 
Solomon.  He  cleared  up  the  numerous  divine  allegories 
and  found  beneath  merely  an  ancient  Oriental  love  poem. 
As  ever,  he  was  bitterly  assailed  and  had  to  flee  from  place 
to  place. 


"HIGHER   CRITICISM"  171 

Ilgen,  1798. 

Next  came  a  Catholic  Scotchman,  Alexander  Geddes,  with 
a  volume  of  critical  remarks  on  the  Old  Testament,  in  1800. 
He  said  the  Pentateuch  was  not  written  by  Moses,  but  was 
the  work  of  many  hands,  and  could  not  have  been  written 
before  David's  time.  Geddes  was  a  man  of  acknowledged 
piety  and  great  scholarship,  but  he  was  condemned  as  a 
"misbeliever,"  "infidel,"  and  "a  would  be  corrector  of  the 
Holy  Ghost." 

Theodore  De  IVette  kept  the  battle  open  by  his  "Introduc- 
tion to  the  Old  Testament,"  in  1805-6.  He  proved  Deu- 
teronomy to  be  a  late  priestly  review  or  resume  of  the  law. 
For  this  splendid  service  he  received  the  usual  thanks — i.  e., 
he  was  driven  from  Germany  and  had  to  be  content  with  a 
Swiss  professorship.  Theodore  Parker  some  years  later 
took  up  his  work  in  America,  translated  his  books,  and 
spread  the  newly  discovered  truths.  He  too  received  the 
Church's  curses,  even  from  the  so-called  "liberal  Church" 
(the  Unitarian). 

But  the  fashion  of  study  was  set.  Even  "the  faithful" 
took  up  the  study  of  these  topics,  since  they  must  appear 
learned.  Of  such  was  Gesenius,  Tholuck,  Julius  Mueller, 
Christlieb,  and  a  host  of  others,  the  champion  of  whom  has 
been  Hengstenberg. 

Graets,  181 2,  Schleiermacher,  1817. 

In  a  long  series  of  the  most  learned  works  from  1823  to 
1875,  Ezvald  took  a  middle  ground.  He  is  far  from  a 
radical,  and  yet  not  conservative  in  the  traditional  orthodox 
sense.  But  this  did  not  save  him  from  considerable  perse- 
cution. 

Milman,  1829,  Stahelin,  1830. 

The  philologian  and  Hegelian  philosopher,  Vatke,  pub- 
lished at  Berlin  in  1835  his  "Religion  of  the  Old  Testament." 
In  it  he  showed  thai  the  Jewish  literature  was  a  natural 
development.  His  lectures  as  a  professor  in  the  University 
were  very  celebrated.  They  were  largely  attended,  and 
many  more  would  gladly  have  heard  them,  yet  "fear  of 


172    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

failing  in  examinations,  tlnougii  knowing  too  much,  kept 
students  away  from  Vatke's  lectures." 

The  critical  tvork  in  the  New  Tcslamcnt  began  with  great 
pozvcr  in  the  publication  of  Strauss's  "Life  of  Jesus"  in  1833. 
The  extreme  opinions  whicli  he  advanced  made  all  New 
Testament  subjects  open  questions  from  then  on.  About 
the  same  time  there  l^egan  in  the  work  of  F.  C.  Baur  a 
movement  known  as  the  "Tuebingen  School."  Its  radical 
views  have  had  an  extremely  powerful  influence. 

Von  Bohlen,  1835,  George,  1835,  Berthau,  1840,  Koestlin, 

1853. 
Hupficld,  an  especially  great  man  in  this  field,  published 

in   1853  a  work  entitled  "The  Sources  of  Genesis."     This 

was  just  one  hundred  years   from  Astruc's  epoch-making 

book.     Hupfield  showed  beyond  any   scholar's  later  doubt 

that  there  are  three  true  documents  combined  in  Genesis, 

each  having  its  own  special  characteristics.     But  the  Church 

had  not  changed  its  attitude  toward  the  truth  and  those  who 

would  discover  it.     Finally  in  1865  a  vigorous  attempt  was 

made  to  punish  him.     He  was  accused  of  irreverence  and 

brought  before  the  Prussian  Government.     Other  professors 

espoused   his   cause,   and   the   accusation    came   to   naught. 

Hupfeld  was  a  careful  student  of  the  Bible,  and  he  could 

not  see  how  it  was  that  Samuel,  David,  Elijah,  and  all  the 

men  of  note  after  Moses  and  before  the  Exile  knew  nothing 

about  and  never  mentioned  the  great  "Mosaic  Law!" 

Reuss  of  Strassburg,  one  of  the  best  writers  of  this  whole 
line,  was  a  professor  in  the  University,  but  for  many  years 
did  not  publish  his  researches  because  he  was  overawed. 
His  students  (Graf,  1866,  and  Kayser,  1874)  developed  his 
tenets  and  gave  them  out.  Since  about  1870  Reuss  has 
given  to  the  world  much  that  is  of  the  highest  order. 

We  have  now  come  to  the  active  period.  Germany  was 
the  great  headquarters  of  Biblical  scholarship.  But  in 
England,  Holland,  and  France,  some  of  the  best  work  has 
been  done.  In  i860  there  appeared  at  London  a  book 
entitled  "Essays  and  Reviews."  It  was  the  work  of  seven 
men,  all  within  the  English  Church,  and  it  was  saturated 


"HIGHER  CRITICISM"  173 

with  the  new  thought.  In  October  of  the  same  year  Bishop 
Wilberforce  of  Oxford  made  an  "elephantine  attack"  on  it. 
(He  it  was  who  a  few  months  before  had  proved  his  hatred 
of  investigation  by  his  attempted  demoUtion  of  Darwin's 
doctrine  of  natural  selection  in  the  origin  of  species.) 
Professor  Jowett,  one  of  the  writers  had  said,  "Interpret 
the  Scriptures  like  any  other  book."  The  mad  Bishop  called 
this  "sophistry."  Another,  Mr.  Goodwin,  had  spoken  of  the 
origin  of  man  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  scientifically 
demonstrated  facts.  This  the  bishop  declared  "sweeps  away 
the  whole  basis  of  Inspiration  and  leaves  no  place  for  the 
Incarnation."  He  called  the  writers  "infidel,"  "atheistic," 
"false,"  and  "wanton."  Of  course,  at  this  late  date,  this  put 
the  book  in  great  demand.  The  more  orthodox  clergy  and 
laity  were  frantic  with  rage  and  fear.  They  begged  the 
bishops  to  save  Christianity  and  the  Church !  Stories  of 
good  Christian  abuse  filled  the  air.  Petitions  were  circu- 
lated urging  people  to  sign  "for  love  of  God,"  (  !)  One  of 
them  had  11,000  signatures.  Archdeacon  Denison  said,  "Of 
all  the  books  in  any  kmguage  which  I  ever  laid  my  hands  on, 
this  is  incomparably  the  worst;  it  contains  all  the  poison 
which  is  to  be  found  in  Tom  Paine's  'Age  of  Reason,'  while 
it  has  the  additional  disadvantage  of  having  been  written 
by  clerg}-men."  The  hysterical  Wilberforce  urged  the 
Church  to  clear  itself  publicly  from  men  who  "gave  up  God's 
Word,  Creation,  Redemption,  and  the  work  of  the  Holy 
Ghost."  Finally  some  test  cases  were  carried  into  Court 
before  Baron  Westbury,  Lord  Chancellor.  The  High  Court 
•  lecided  that  it  could  not  punish  clergymen  for  hoping  the 
ultimate  pardon  of  the  wicked ! !  Scjme  cynic  put  the  ver- 
dict thus:  "The  Court  dismissed  Hell  with  costs." 

This  was  the  first  great  victory  of  scientific  scholarship 
in  investigating  traditional  books  and  dogmas.  The  "holy 
infallible  Church"  and  its  "sacred  inerrant  books"  became 
thereafter  subjects  of  scientific  analysis  and  investigation. 

I  can  only  add  the  names  of  so)ne  of  the  recent  leaders 
in  this  great  army  of  truth-seekers.  They  belong  to  that 
greater  army  of  Science  that  has  made  these  later  years 


174    A    RFXEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

more  memorable  than  any  in  human  history  by  the 
unparalleled  number  and  value  of  its  discoveries.  (The 
dates  attached,  as  heretofore,  are  those  in  which  these 
writers'  greatest  contributions  appeared.) 


Colenso 

1862-69 

Juelicher 

1880 

Davidson 

•62-93 

W.  R.  Smith 

'81 

Holtzman 

'63 

Giesebrecht 

f> 

Renan 

» 

Budde 

•> 

Keim 

'67 

Riehm 

'84 

Noeldeke 

'69 

Koenig 

n 

Kuenen 

'69-89 

Schrader 

•86 

Arnold 

'73 

Dillman 

'86 

HoUenberg 

'74 

Stade 

•87 

Hilgenfeld 

•75 

Kitten 

•88 

Delitsch 

•76 

Baerthgen 

n 

Wellhausen 

»> 

Baudissin 

•89 

Stanley 

•77 

Brugsch 

'91 

Ryssel 

'78 

Sayce 

•93 

Hausrath 

'79 

Addis 

•93 

To  these  should  be  added  the  names  of  Weiss,  Weissaeck- 
er,  Hanson,  Reville,  Tiele,  Pfleiderer,  "Supernatural  Reli- 
gion" (anonymous,)  Zeller,  Schenkel,  Bredenkaump,  E.  A. 
Abbott,  Ezra  Abbott,  Driver,  Westcott,  Sandy,  Cheyne, 
Smend,  Comhill,  Reichter,  Samuel,  Thayer,  Toy,  Ball, 
Harnack,  Haupt,  Cheyne  and  Black's  Encyclopedia  Biblica, 
Hasting's  Bible  Dictionary,  Hasting's  Encyclopedia  of 
Religion  and  Ethics,  etc.,  etc. 

One  transcending  event  must  be  listed  separately.  This 
is  the  "Code  of  Hammurabi"  discovered  (1901-2)  by 
Jacques  de  Morgan  at  the  Acropolis  of  the  ancient  city  of 
Susa.  It  is  the  most  elaborate  document  from  ancient  times, 
and  has  enormous  importance  in  tracing  origins  of  customs, 
laws  and  other  phases  of  civilizations.  It  details  an  aston- 
ishing amount  of  information  about  ancient  conditions,  and 
refutes  hundreds  of  assumptions  made  by  biblicists  for  cen- 
turies. It  was  written  before  the  date  assigned  to  Abraham 
and  over  a  1000  years  before  Moses's  time.  It  dates  as  far 
back  of  Alexander  the  Great  as  he  does  from  us.  It 
portrays  a   Semitic-Babylonian  civilization  which  was  the 


"HIGHER  CRITICISM"  175 

source  of  the  Jewish,  tut  was  much  loftier  than  the  Hebrews 
ever  attained  to.  It  shows  the  loss  to  culture  and  progress 
by  the  lapse  of  the  Mesopotamian  peoples  into  oblivion. 

The  list  is  intended  to  be  suggestit,'e  rather  than  complete. 
It  is  probable  that  I  have  omitted  many,  and  perhaps  some 
of  the  greatest.  Thought  of  together,  they  inspire  us  with 
the  vastness  of  the  labor  and  research  expended  in  putting 
the  Bible  before  mankind  in  a  rational  way.  The  grand 
results  of  these  numerous  and  age-long  investigations  were 
expected  to  be  summed  up  in  the  "Polychrome  Bible"  edited 
by  Prof.  Paul  Haupt,  Ph.  D.,  of  Johns  Hopkins  University. 
But  alas !  In  the  twentieth  century,  this,  too,  had  to  stop — 
because  of  Church  opposition !  Yet  the  principle  of 
"Higher  Criticism"  has  triumphed.  Its  day  of  sway  is  near 
at  hand. 


CHAPTER  XV 
THE  OLD  BIBLE 

WHAT  IS  IT  THEN?      WHERE  DID  IT  COME  FROM? 

HOW  AND  WHEN  WAS  IT  WRITTEN? 

WHAT  IS  ITS  RELATIVE  IMPORTANCE  AND  AUTHORITY? 

Writing  is  a  wonderful  thing — most  wonderful  to  those 
who  do  not  know  the  process.  A  missionary  in  the  Fijis 
was  working  some  distance  from  his  cottage.  He  needed 
his  handsaw,  and  wrote  on  a  chip  a  message  for  his  wife  to 
send  it  by  the  native  who  was  helping  him.  The  fellow 
delivered  the  chip,  received  the  saw  and  returned.  He  be- 
lieved there  was  a  spirit  in  the  chip  which  told  the  woman 
what  her  husband  wanted.  To  insure  the  continued  service 
of  that  spirit,  he  bored  a  hole  in  the  chip  and  hung  it  around 
his  neck. 

A  book  is  only  more  of  the  same  mysterious  message- 
making.  The  ignorant  are  awed  by  it.  Mystic  reverence 
commands  them.  They  have  no  way  of  explaining  its  origin 
save  by  supernatural,  invisible  power.  By  and  by  the 
writings  become  a  fetich.  If  they  do  not  contain  an  actual 
spirit,  they  are  the  vehicle  of  the  spirit's  will,  They  are  its 
inspired  message. 

"Bibles"  are  the  collections  of  old  and  assumably  wise  and 
sacred  traditions  of  ancient  peoples.  All  the  historical  races 
had  them.  Hebrews,  Greeks,  Romans,  Egyptians,  Persians, 
Hindus,  Chinese,  Scandinavians  had  sacred  writings  and 
many  barbarous  peoples  have  oral  sacred  traditions.  These 
books  contain  their  thought  and  early  theories  about  the 
world  and  God  and  man.  In  cases  where  they  cover  the 
thought  of  centuries,  they  are  unique  history  of  the  evolu- 

176 


THE  OLD  BIBLE  177 

tion  of  the  people.  In  them  are  found  the  germs  of  all  that 
the  race  has  striven  for,  all  that  it  has  feared  and  hoped, 
hated  or  loved;  and  that  which  it  has  laid  most  stress  upon 
has  Uved. 

I  am  to  speak  of  the  Jewish  and  Christian  Bibles ;  but  I 
might  treat  in  similar  way  the  sacred  traditions  of  each  of 
the  great  races  prominent  in  the  Ancient  World. 

The  book  we  call  "The  Bible"  contains  pieces  composed 
2()00  or  ^000  years  ago,  while  its  later  portions  are  1200 
years  younger.  Hundreds  of  authors  have  had  a  hand  in  it, 
and  the  national,  ethical,  and  religious  interests  that  have 
centered  there  have  finally  given  us  a  body  of  thought  greatly 
different  from  the  original  sources.  As  it  stands,  it  is  a 
collection  of  pamphlets,  all  regarded  as  equally  sacred,  bound 
in  one  volume,  and  designated  by  the  meaningless  expres- 
sion, "The  Bible,"  i.  e..  The  Book.  This  title  is  only  about 
five  centuries  old.  It  is  the  Latin  expression  made  English. 
The  Greek  Bible,  Ta  Biblia  (The  Books)  was  used  down  to 
the  time  when  the  Church  became  absolute  in  its  authority. 
Then  the  fiat  of  bigotry  assumed  a  unity  where  there  was 
none. 

Again,  even  the  title  Ta  Biblia  (The  Books)  was  not  used 
till  the  5th  century  A.  D.  The  word  "Scriptures"  then  in- 
cluded the  Old  and  New  Testaments.  After  the  return  of 
the  revived  Jewish  nation  (536  B.  C),  there  were  few 
more  original  "Writings,"  and  the  whole  effort  thereafter 
was  to  preserve  the  inheritance  of  the  past.  Under  this 
inspiration  the  Old  Testament  was  collected. 

Against  all  this  conservatism  and  devotion  to  the  past,  the 
fresher  spirits  arrayed  themselves.  The  greatest  of  these 
and  the  one  who  made  by  far  the  greatest  impression  was 
Jesus.  He  was  the  open  enemy  of  the  .Scribes.  His  tragic 
death  was  seized  upon  by  Paul  to  turn  the  current  of 
Judaism  into  new  channels.  And  he  succeeded  on  a  great 
scale.  To  do  this,  he  preached  and  fcjunded  new  organiza- 
tions (churches),  and  later  wrote  letters  of  exhortation  to 
some  of  those  ecclesia  (assemblies).  These  letters  (epistles) 
were  preserved,  and  they  became  "sacred  writings."     Fol- 


178    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

lowing  his  inspiration,  many  others  wrote  "epistles"  and 
"gospels."  Before  two  centuries  had  passed  a  considerable 
body  of  new  sacred  writings  had  appeared.  During  the 
third  and  fourth  centuries  these  were  gathered  and  sifted 
and  rewritten  and  grouped  into  a  body  called  collectively  the 
"New  Covenant"  or  "New  Testament." 

The  various  overflow  writings,  those  rejected  by  the  coun- 
cils, came  to  be  called  "apocryphal."  Of  these  25  are  pre- 
served and  over  70  have  perished. 

As  to  Language — the  Old  Testament  and  Jewish  Apocry- 
phal Pamphlets  were  written  in  Hebrew.  Most  of  the  New 
Testament  was  first  written  in  Greek.  Most  of  the  Old 
Testament  was  translated  into  Greek  in  the  second  and  third 
centuries  B.  C.  In  the  third  century  A.  D.  both  Old  and  New 
Testaments  were  translated  into  Latin.  And  in  that  tongue 
they  remained  (accessible  only  to  the  priest)  until  Wiclif  of 
England  in  the  fourteenth  century,  Hus  of  Bohemia  in  the 
fifteenth  and  other  reformers  later  translated  them  into  their 
native  tongues. 

The  originals  zuere  written  on  skins  and  papyrus  rolls. 
The  letters  were  in  large  capitals,  and  were  run  together 
without  division  of  words,  without  punctuation,  without 
accents  or  breathings,  and  in  the  Hebrew  without  the  vowel 
points.  The  books  had  no  heading-titles  nor  signatures. 
There  were  no  verses  nor  chapters.  {The  first  Bible  w^ith 
chapters  and  verses  was  printed  by  Henry  Stephens  in  Paris, 

^551) 

Now  in  the  work  of  the  old  copyists  and  translators  hun- 
dreds and  thousands  of  errors  got  in.  There  were  many 
slips  of  the  eye,  many  mistakes  of  judgment,  and  many 
intentional  changes  and  additions.  They  "improved"  the 
.s^rammar,  the  style,  the  thought,  or  the  doctrine  "so  that 
they  should  be  correct!"  The>  interpolated  passages  from 
the  Old  Testament  into  the  New  or  from  other  manuscripts. 
They  did  not  feel  the  strict  moral  sense  that  we  now  insist 
on.  It  was  all  in  the  interest  of  truth,  and  for  the  glory  of 
God!  Often  they  made  explanations  in  the  margin,  and  the 
next  copyist  put  these  into  the  text  as  "better!"     The  grand 


THE  OLD  BIBLE  179 

result  is,  of  the  ancient  manuscripts  none  agree  with  each 
other! 

Now  as  to  the  Sacredness  of  the  books  or  the  writings. 
Only  the  Old  Testament  has  been  "sacred"  to  the  Jewish 
People ;  only  the  Old  and  New  Testaments  to  the  Protestant 
Christians;  while  the  Old  and  New  Testaments  together 
with  the  Apocryphas  are  revered  by  the  Roman  and  Greek 
Catholics. 

The  Arrangement  of  these  books  in  our  common  Bible  is 
not  the  original  one,  nor  is  it  the  order  in  which  they  were 
written.  Genesis  was  not  written  first  nor  Revelation  last. 
The  order  which  we  find  in  our  Bibles  was  only  very 
gradually  adopted,  and  did  not  reach  the  present  fixed 
arrangement  until  since  the  rise  of  Protestantism  in  the 
sixteenth  century. 

The  Canon  of  the  Scriptures,  i.  e.,  the  list  of  the  so-called 
genuine  books  and  their  proper  order,  has  been  repeatedly 
changed.  Our  common  Protestant  English  version  includes 
thirty-nine  writings  in  the  Old  Testament  and  twenty-seven 
in  the  New.  We  divide  the  Old  Testament  into  two  parts, 
prose  and  poetry,  the  prose  ending  with  Esther.  We  make 
other  divisions  of  Law,  History,  Prophecy,  Psalms,  Pro- 
verbs, and  so  forth.  But  this  was  not  at  all  the  Jewish 
arrangement.  During  two  or  three  hundred  years  before 
the  CTiristian  era  began,  they  reckoned  them  as  the  Law,  the 
Prophets,  and  the  Writings.  The  Law  included  only  the 
first  five  books;  the  Prophets  included  Joshua,  Judges,  Sam- 
uel, Kings,  Isaiah,  Jeremiah,  Ezekiel,  and  the  twelve  minor 
prophets;  and  the  Writings  included  the  rest,  and  at  times 
certain  apocryphal  works. 

Until  after  the  return  from  the  Babylonian  Captivity 
(536  B.  C.)  there  was  no  canon  and  no  "sacred"  writings 
among  the  Jews.  What  little  literature  existed  was 
regarded  as  precious,  but  not  "sacred  authority."  After  the 
return  from  the  Captivity  the  most  vigorous  attem]>ts  were 
made  for  a  revival  (;f  the  old  Jewish  nation.  All  possible 
ancient  writings  were  re-copied  and  re-edited.  The  "Law" 
took  on  an  extended  form.     Histories  and  Prophecies  and 


i8o    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Psalms  were  collected.  The  people  were  exhorted  to  return 
to  the  virtues  of  their  forefathers.  Solomon,  David,  Moses, 
Joseph,  Jacob,  Isaac,  Abraham  became  national  heroes  in 
a  far  greater  emphasis  than  before.  All  great  deeds  and 
sayings  of  unknown  origin  were  ascribed  to  them  and  there- 
after recorded  as  their  teachings.  Of  course  this  was  not 
all  equally  easy.  Some  of  the  books  and  stories  gained 
their  title  rank  with  great  difficulty.  There  was  often  much 
opposition.  But  most  of  the  records  of  opposition  have 
perished  and  have  not  reached  us.  Had  it  not  been  for  the 
ambition  to  increase  their  authority  by  making  the  body  of 
sacred  classics  as  large  as  possible,  such  books  as  Ecclesias- 
tes,  Esther,  Song  of  Solomon,  and  Ezekiel  would  not  have 
been  included.  Ecclesiastes  is  positively  sceptical  and  irre- 
ligious. Esther  contains  no  mention  of  the  name  of  God. 
The  Song  of  Solomon  is  a  sensuous  love  poem  bordering 
on  the  unchaste.  Ezekiel  in  the  last  eight  chapters  contains 
an  account  utterly  contradicting  the  statements  in  the  Penta- 
teuch containing  the  origin  of  the  priestly  class. 

As  to  Dates — modem  scientific  historical  research  has 
unearthed  such  a  vast  body  of  fact  and  error  that  one  knows 
not  where  to  begin  or  what  to  leave  out.  The  Jewish  and 
the  Christian  priesthoods  have  added  confusion  to  chaos. 
For  2500  years  they  have  been  doctoring  history  and 
religious  literature  to  prove  their  systems !  They  have 
combined  and  re-written  book  after  book,  and  have  put 
headings  and  signatures  to  every  work  to  suit  their  doctrinal 
and  sectarian  interests.  They  interpolated  and  left  out 
where  they  pleased.  They  have  mutilated  everything  they 
have  touched,  and  where  they  have  not  been  able  to  do  this, 
they  have  written  notes  and  commentaries  explaining  away 
the  manifest  meaning  and  substituting  allegorical  or  doc- 
trinal ones.  They  have  fictitiously  made  a  canon  which 
never  before  existed;  and  to  climax  all,  they  have  claimed 
for  their  own  stupid  forgeries  and  historical  distortions  the 
seal  of  a  Divine  inspiration.* 

•  I  must  here  refer  to  the  higher  critical  chronological  recon- 
struction of  the  Old  and  New  Testaments  and  Apocryphal  litera- 


THE  OLD  BIBLE  i8i 

I  shall  not,  and  need  not,  say  many  words  regarding  The 
Authority  of  such  a  patchwork  of  literature  as  the  priest- 
hood of  ignorant  and  barbarous  ages  has  handed  on  to 
more  enlightened  times.  To  those  who  know  some  of  the 
leading  facts  there  neither  is  nor  can  be  any  "authority" 
about  it.  Even  the  ver}^  name  "Testament"  is  a  mistrans- 
lation of  the  Greek  word  which  means  "covenant,"  and  the 
word  "Bible,"  which  implies  a  unity,  has  no  deeper  meaning 
than  the  thread  and  sheepskin  which  hold  together  pamphlets 
often  utterly  incongruous  and  inharmonious  in  their  teach- 
ings. "Bible"  means  book,  but  this  is  not  a  hook  in  any 
other  sense  than  a  Jewish  miscellany  or  religious  collection 
book.  It  is  a  very  miscellaneous  and  very  curious  collection 
of  writings  from  lyoo  to  jooo  years  old,  mostly  written  by 
unknown  people,  translated  from  ancient  and  poorly  under- 
stood tongues  by  men  whose  positions  and  livlihoods  de- 
pended on  the  correspondence  of  the  results  with  traditional 
doctrines,  and  upheld  as  an  "authority"  by  the  largest,  the 
oldest,  the  most  bigoted,  and  the  most  unprogressive  insti- 
tution the  Occident  has  developed.  Such  is  the  "authority" 
of  "The  Bible." 

Some  of  it  (a  small  part)  speaks  the  highest  moral  pre- 
cepts and  ideals ;  some  of  it  (a  larger  part)  speaks  the 
lowest  moral  hatreds  and  passions ;  some  of  it  (a  still  larger 
part)  speaks  nothing  at  all  helpful  (except  as  aids  to 
history)   to  the  latest  and  most  enlightened  civilization. 

That  the  claim  of  Infallibility,  that  the  pretense  of  being 
the  foundation  of  religion  should  have  been  made  for  this 
unique  literary  muddle,  are  monstrous  beyond  conception; 
and  are  only  to  be  accounted  for  by  the  past  and  present  bar- 
barism out  of  which  they  sprang  and  in  which  they  survive. 
Religion  based  on  "The  Bible" !  And  all  the  ages  before  its 
forged  collections  and  all  the  nations  and  races  who  have 
lived  and  built  up  civilizations  that  are  the  lasting  wonder 

ture.     A  very  readable  and  popular  statement  of  this  Is  given 
In  Rev.  John  W.  Chadwlck's  "The  Bible  of  Today." 


i82    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

of  all  who  know  enough  to  admire  greatness— all  these  had 
no  religion  worth  the  name !  No,  religion  is  not  based  on 
writing,  bound  or  unbound!  Much  of  "The  Bible"  is  not 
even  religious.  As  a  whole,  it  is  but  a  much-meddled-with 
record  of  the  struggles  and  troubles  and  trials  of  one 
religion. 

Your  religion  and  mine  are  between  us  and  our  God;  and 
the  actual  "God,"  whether  we  know  him  well  or  little — 
h  the  same,  now  and  forever.  No  book,  nor  man,  nor 
church,  nor  God,  nor  "Son  of  God"  can  save  us.  We  can 
save  ourselves  here  or  hereafter,  by  learning  and  living  the 
always  present,  actual,  natural  conditions,  (which  are  the 
only  "Divine"  laws).  For  every  violation  we  must  bear 
the  consequences — not  in  some  future  hell,  but  from  now 
on.  Therefore  let  us  learn  the  truth — whether  from  ancient 
or  modern  sources. 


CHAPTER  XVI 
INSPIRATION,  REVELATION,  AND  SACREDNESS 

THEIR  EARLY  AND  LATER   MEANING;    THEIR 
APPLICATION  TO  JEWISH  AND  CHRISTIAN  WRITINGS 

"Inspiration"  is  an  English  form  from  the  Latin  verb 
Inspirarc,  to  breathe  into.  The  Greek  word  was  Theopneu- 
stia.  This  shows  better  the  old-time  meaning,  "God- 
breathed." 

Old-time  meanings  are  impressive  to  those  who  think  old- 
times  were  better  and  fuller  of  opportunities.  To  an  Evo- 
lutionist, old-time  means  a  time  of  less  development.  He 
sees  the  growth  of  the  world,  and  finds  former  ages,  on  the 
whole  and  in  most  particulars,  lower  than  the  present, — the 
more  so  as  the  times  are  more  remote.  The  Traditionalist, 
on  the  contrary,  sees  the  perfect  in  the  past.  "Edens  of 
blissful  innocence  are  behind.  In  the  days  that  were  men 
lived  near  to  God.  To  the  men  of  yore  God  made  known 
his  will." 

This  attitude  is  to  be  found  among  all  primitive  and  all 
ancient  races.  It  has  universally  been  the  mode  of  sus- 
taining authority,  viz.,  to  appeal  to  its  divine  origin.  The 
Christian  religion  is  not  in  the  least  exceptional.  The 
Classics  of  Greece  and  Rome  abound  in  phrases  and  allu- 
sions of  the  same  sort.  In  Homer,  Aeschylus,  Plato,  Virgil, 
Plutarch,  anrl  many  others,  there  are  numerous  expressions 
of  the  same  theory ;  but  ignorance  of  other  religions  and 
literatures  has  made  prevalent  the  belief  that  the  Christian 
traditions  alone  possess  the  peculiar  claim  and  merit  of 
having  been  supematurally  breathed  into  the  minds  of 
sacred  writer;)  in  long  ago  ages.     This  ludicrous  egotism  is 

183 


i84    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

lost  as  soon  as  men  come  to  study  other  sacred  books  and 
religions  besides  their  own. 

Formerly  all  gifts  and  talents  of  whatever  desirable  sort 
were  ascribed  to  special  divine  origin.  The  ability  to  read 
or  write,  to  draw  or  paint,  to  preach  or  poetize,  to  help  or 
heal, — in  fact,  anything  beyond  the  most  common-place 
living-getting  capacity  was  either  specially  "given  of  God" 
or  "called  of  God."  The  history  of  this  belief  is  a  long  one, 
and  has  had  its  many  transformations.  It  is  still  held  by  a 
majority  of  the  population.  It  is  now  and  has  been  for 
many  centuries  one  of  the  central  features  of  the  popular 
religion. 

By  this  theory  the  collection  of  books  called  "The  Bible" 
is  accounted  for.  They  form  the  "Revelation  of  God  to 
mankind."  They  are  "The  Word  of  God."  They  were 
written  by  "holy  men  of  God,  who  spake  as  they  were  moved 
by  the  Holy  Ghost."  For  1800  years  the  changes  have  been 
rung  upon  this  idea.  Many  modifications  and  subtleties 
have  been  introduced  in  order  to  meet  the  continually  rising 
objections  to  its  unnatural  and  preposterous  claims. 

Whether  one  believes  in,  or  whether  one  could  believe  in, 
a  special  supernatural  or  providential  inspiration  will  at  the 
start  depend  on  how  much  or  how  little  he  knows  of  God 
and  Nature.  If  his  God  is  anthropomorphic  and  has  human 
attributes,  if  Deity  is  to  him  a  being  outside  of  or  above  the 
world,  there  can  be  no  difficulty  in  his  mind  about  Divine 
intervention  at  Divine  pleasure.  But  if  God  is  the  all- 
pervading  Spirit-Energy  in  the  world  known  to  man  as 
Causal-Power  and  Law  and  Life,  that  Power  of  which  the 
universe  is  but  the  manifestation,  then  the  notion  of  outside 
inspiration  or  special  assistance  is  a  weak  and  dogmatic 
absurdity. 

For  each  and  everyone,  the  problem  of  "Divine  inspiration" 
of  book  or  man  must  be  settled  by  his  own  reason.  Reason 
(cerebral,  associational  activity)  is  the  highest  authority, 
for  if  the  Bible  is  "inspired"  we  have  to  determine  this  by 
reasoning.  Those  who  say  it  is  directly  from  God,  say  it 
because  their  reason  affirms  it,    Those  who  reject  this,  do 


INSPIRATION,   REVELATION,   SACREDNESS     185 

so  because  their  reason  refuses  the  dogma.  Look  at  it  as  we 
may,  it  is  a  question  of  evidence.  Neither  assumptions  of 
higher  powers  nor  high-toned  scorn  of  the  conclusions  of 
others  have  the  least  effect  in  the  settlement  of  such  a  prob- 
lem. What  presuppositions  do  you  start  with?  What  are 
the  evidences?  What  are  you  thinking  about  when  you  say 
"God?"  What  do  you  mean  by"inspiration?"  Then,  on 
the  basis  of  these  premises,  is  the  Bible  inspired  for  you? 

To  me,  "God"  is  the  Infinite  and  Eternal  Energy  pervad- 
ing and  filling  all  space;  the  Power  that  is  at  one  and  the 
same  time  the  Evolver  and  the  Essence  of  all  worlds,  all 
life,  all  growth,  all  change,  and  all  beauty.  As  there  is 
nothing  outside  of  God,  so  there  is  no  God  outside  of 
Nature.  God  is  nature  and  Nature  is  all.  God  participates 
in  all  being — in  my  being.  There  is  no  God  outside  of, 
over  against,  or  entirely  separate  from  the  world.  There 
is  not  and  cannot  be  anything  super-natural.  God  never 
did  and  cannot  do  a  super-natural  thing.  Whatever  is,  is 
a  part  of  Divine  Nature.  Divinity  equals  Nature.  Nature 
is  Divinity.  God  is  Nature  and  Nature  is  natural.  Divinity 
is  not  outside  of  Nature.  There  is  nothing  outside  of  Na- 
ture. This  is  the  induction  of  that  great  body  of  Know- 
ledge, the  Modern  Sciences.  It  is  virtually  the  highest 
demonstrated  result  of  these  combined  studies. 

Now  let  us  apply  this  idea.  "Inspiration,"  as  previously 
held  by  Christian  and  Pagan,  implies  a  God  outside  of  you 
and  outside  of  Nature.  It  was  believed  that  God  trans- 
cendentally  or  supernaturally  breathed  into  men  his  spirit 
and  will,  as  well  as  the  history  of  the  past  and  the  forecast 
of  the  future.  It  belongs  to  those  who  hold  this  to  first 
find  and  exhibit  their  god  or  to  give  evidence  of  his  exist- 
ence. Of  such  an  external  .'supernatural  being  there  is  not 
and  never  was  the  slightest  evidence.  Such  a  conception 
has  its  origin  in  an  entire  misconception  of  the  Divine 
Nature.  Such  ideas  arose  in  uncritical,  untrained,  and  un- 
scientific minds,  and  they  only  continue  to  be  held  by  such 
minds. 

Now  if  there  is  no  external  super-natural  god,  there  is  no 


i86    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

possibility  of  a  transcendental,  super-natural  in-breathing  of 
a  Divine  will,  spirit,  and  so  forth.  //  God  is  in  Nature,  in- 
cluding matt,  then  the  Dizine  spirit  or  will  is  out-breathed  or 
expired  and  the  doctrine  becomes  one  of  expiration  instead 
of  "inspiration."  (I  am  here  using  the  terms  in  their  purely 
etymological  sense.)  But  according  to  the  demonstrated 
proofs  of  the  nature  of  God  and  of  his  working,  there  is 
nothing  super-natural  in  the  process.  Nature's  or  God's 
laws  or  conditions  are  revealed.  They  have  been  being  re- 
vealed in  all  the  ages.  There  is  an  ever-present  Revelation. 
It  is  not,  however,  God's  face  that  is  being  unveiled ;  it  is 
man's.  This  unveiling  has  taken  place  in  and  through 
human  experiences.  Man  in  them  has  observed  the  working 
of  the  laws.  Those  laws  he  has  studied  in  further  experi- 
ences, and  finally  verified  hundreds  and  thousands  of  them. 
This  is  Science  and  this  is  Revelation,  and  both  are  one, 
and  both  are  equal  or  identical.  It  is  the  law  of  God  out- 
breathed  or  expired  by  the  perfectly  natural  process  of 
human  eflfort  learning  and  working  in  accord  with  the  Divine 
(or  Natural)  laws  in  man  and  in  his  surrounding  circum- 
stances. 

Moreover,  man  needs  no  other  revelation.  When  he 
works  with  the  open  eyes  of  reason  in  his  experiences,  the 
Divine  or  Natural  ways  and  laws  are  continually  and  easily 
revealed.  All  the  so-called  "revelations"  are  revelations 
only  in  so  far  as  they  embody  the  real  truths  of  human 
discovery  by  experience.  Doubtless  they  one  and  all  contain 
many  such  truths.  But  this  is  an  utterly  dififerent  thing 
from  the  claims  made  by  which  they  are  held  up  as  the  only 
holy  and  sacred  word  to  man. 

Now  let  us  apply  these  Principles  to  the  Jewish-Christian 
Bible,  and  the  claims  made  for  it.  The  first  thing  v/e  meet 
is  the  inscription  "Holy  Bible"  on  the  cover.  In  nine 
churches  out  of  ten,  the  clergymen  refer  to  the  volume  as 
the  "Word  of  God."  So  in  the  schools  of  theology  it  has 
been  treated  and  defended  as  "the  inspired  and  infallible 
revelation"    of    a    super-natural    God    by    a    super-natural 


INSPIRATION,   REVELATION,   SACREDNESS     187 

method.     Surely  the  plain  and  honest  meaning  of  this  is, 
not  that  part  of  it,  but  all  of  it  is  sacred. 

WHAT  MAKES  IT  HOLY  AND  SACRED? 

Let  us  ask  some  serious  questions.  Do  not  think  me 
unkind  if  they  seem  almost  profane.  We  must  he  honest. 
We  must  each  anszver  them  before  the  bar  of  the  indwelling 
God,  our  rationalised  self-respect,  according  to  the  light  of 
our  intelligence.     We  are  dealing  zvith  profound  facts. 

Is  the  whole  volume  holy  and  sacred  because  one  part  of 
it  gives  two  contradictory  accounts  of  a  creation  that  never 
occurred  ? 

Is  it  all  holy  and  sacred  because  it  describes  a  god  who 
never  existed  as  "walking  in  the  garden  in  the  cool  of  the 
day?" 

Is  it  all  holy  and  sacred  because  it  relates  as  true  the 
primitive  legend  of  woman  being  created  from  a  rib  of  man 
by  a  bungling  man-god? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  relates  the  absurd  story 
of  Cain  and  his  "mark"  and  the  "City"  which  he  built  all 
alone  for  himself  alone? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  gives  two  contradictory 
gencologies  of  the  race  of  man,  one  from  Cain  and  another 
from  Seth? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  relates  the  myth  of  a 
deluge  (which  science  has  demonstrated  could  not  have 
occurred)  as  if  it  were  real  history?* 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  sets  up  as  the  most  revered 
the  righteous  patriarch,  Abraham,  a  man  whom  the  records 
say  betrayed  liis  servant-girl,  Hagar,  and  then  turned  her 
and  the  child  out  into  the  desert  to  starve? 

Is  it  holy  anfl  sacred  because  it  pretends  that  this  man 
was  chosen  of  God  to  be  the  ancestor  of  the  people  through 
whom  the  workl  was  to  be  taught  religion  and  salvation? 


*  TliP  total  Kafuratinn  of  tho  oarth's  atnioHphrre  at  the  utmost 
could  precipitate  a  rainfall  of  only  four  inchen! 


i88    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  this  god  promised  to  steal 
for  this  barbarian  and  his  descendants  all  the  country  "from 
the  river  of  Egypt  to  the  great  river  Euphrates"  (Gen.  XV. 
i8),  ("to  thee  will  give  it,  and  to  thy  seed  forever.")  (Gen. 
XIII,  15);  and  because  only  a  small  part  of  it  was  ever 
in  their  possession,  and  even  that  part  was  taken  from  them 
several  times ;  and  because  for  over  a  thousand  years  hardly 
one  of  his  descendants  has  held  a  foot  of  it? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  makes  this  god  sanction 
and  elevate  to  the  patriarchate  the  man,  Jacob,  who  took 
advantage  of  his  starving  brother  and  cheated  him  out  of 
his  birthright,  and  whose  record  in  many  other  matters  was 
like  that  of  the  men  whom  we  keep  in  our  state  prisons 
today  ? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  elevates  to  the  first  place 
as  a  religious  teacher  the  man,  Moses,  whom  the  records 
openly  describe  as  a  murderer,  a  sorcerer,  and  a  cruel 
barbarian  ? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  makes  Joshua  and  his 
army,  by  command  of  God,  enter  the  neighboring  land  of 
Canaan  and  kill  not  only  men,  but  women  and  children,  and 
finally  take  violent  possession  of  all  the  lands  and  chattels 
of  peoples  who  had  done  them  no  wrong? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  holds  up  as  a  model  and 
a  man  after  God's  own  heart  the  barbarous  chieftain,  David 
whom  the  righteousness  of  the  Sioux  Indian,  Sitting  Bull, 
would  put  to  shame? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  it  holds  up  as  the  wisest  of 
men  the  tyrant,  free-lover,  and  libertine,  Solomon,  who  gave 
himself  700  legal  wives  and  added  to  his  household  also 
300  prostitutes  ? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  the  ancient  Jewish  people 
whose  history  it  records  never  reached  as  a  whole  a  stage  of 
civilization  nearly  so  high  as  Greeks,  Romans,  and  Egyp- 
tians, whom  they  always  despised? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  we  do  not  know  even  one- 
fifth  of  its  writers? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  many  of  its  books  are  a 


INSPIRATION,   REVELATION,   SACREDNESS     189 

patch-work  made  from  various  writings  by  unknown  hands  ? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  a  number  of  books  are 
forgeries  by  unknown  men  in  times  later  than  those  from 
which  they  pretend  to  come? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  the  accounts  of  Jesus'  life 
were  written  by  men  who  only  knew  of  him  by  hearsay  and 
who  without  exception  wrote  from  sixty  to  one  hundred  and 
forty  years  after  he  was  dead? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  Paul,  the  man  who  founded 
the  Christian  system  of  dogma,  never  saw  Jesus  on  whom  he 
based  it,  and  wrote  his  first  accounts  or  letters  about  it  over 
twenty  years  after  Jesus  was  gone? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  half  a  dozen  of  the  epistles 
written  to  support  that  Pauline  doctrine  are  forgeries  attri- 
buted to  Paul,  John,  and  Peter  in  order  to  give  them  greater 
authority  ? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  its  writings  were  never  put 
together  and  officially  pronounced  as  "holy  and  sacred"  till 
300  years  after  all  its  events  had  occurred,  and  then  only  by 
political  aid  of  the  crafty  Emperor  Constantine? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  in  it  there  are  several 
hundred  direct  contradictions  and  irreconcilable  statements? 

Is  it  holy  and  sacred  because  even  the  noblest  doctrines 
it  propounds  are  too  primitively  stated  for  the  leading 
thinkers  in  this  hundred-fold  more  enlightened  age? 

And,  finally,  is  it  actually  and  really  any  more  holy  and 
sacred  because  men  for  1500  years  have  made  a  fetich  of  it? 

/  do  not  answer  for  you  when  I  say,  no:  these  are  glaring 
defects  which  only  an  amazing  ignorance  or  an  awful  selfish- 
ness could  overlook.  Considered  as  the  bulk  of  the  ancient 
Jewish  literature,  the  "Bible"  has  great  value  in  many  ways. 
Of  these  I  have  often  spoken,  and  especially  in  the  chapter 
on  "The  Beauties  of  the  Old  Bible."  But  considered  as 
"religious  authority"  today,  it  is  the  most  baneful  influence 
now  opposing  human  progress.     Instead  of  being  the  cause 


I90    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

of  progress,  (as  its  mistaken  devotees  assert)  it  continually 
diverts  human  attention  from  the  now  known  facts  and 
keeps  millions  facing  backwards.  It  is  the  nucleus  for  an 
organized  effort  to  arrest  the  development  of  the  masses. 
In  proportion  as  its  authority  is  breaking  is  man  advancing. 
The  times  when  this  authority  zvas  greatest  were  the  "Dark 
Ages."  From  the  Renaissance  till  now,  the  men  to  zvhom 
the  world  owes  its  marvelous  advance  in  enlightenment  have 
denied  its  authority  in  every  discovery  and  demonstration. 

As  literature  let  us  prize  it  as  an  invaluable  historical 
treasure.  Let  us  unbind  it.  Let  us  separate  the  books  and 
be  as  honest  with  them  as  we  are  with  other  ancient  litera- 
ture. Let  each  writing  stand  on  its  own  merits.  Nor  let 
us  further  tolerate  the  old  pretense  of  an  extraordinary 
merit  for  all  its  parts,  a  claim  which  has  no  deeper  virtue 
than  that  of  the  binding  that  holds  them  together.  Thus 
regarded,  some  of  the  writings  will  go  to  deserved  oblivion; 
others  will  rise  to  their  true  dignity,  and  these  will  be  to 
man  an  inspiring  instead  of  a  reversionary  influence.  The 
degrading  power  of  authority  will  vanish  only  when  the 
books  are  thus  honestly  considered. 

Then  shall  men  see  the  real  truth,  that  like  all  other 
collections,  ancient  or  modern,  they  contain  the  good,  the 
bad,  and  the  indifferent.  The  good  we  shall  always  love  and 
praise. 


PART  FOUR 

THE    SUBSTITUTED    AUTHORITY 
OF    SCIENCE 


CHAPTER  XVIT 
THE  NEW  BIBLE 

WHAT    IS    IT?      WHO    WRITES    IT? 

"The  word  unto  the  prophets  spoken 
Was  writ  on  tables  yet  unbroken; 
The  word  by  seers  or  sibyls  told, 
In  groves  of  oak,  or  fanes  of  gold, 
Still  floats  upon  the  morning  wind, 
Still  whispers  to  the  willing  mind." 

EMERSON 

"Bible"  means  sacred  text -book  authority — written  source 
of  truth  regarding  G(jd,  the  heavens,  the  world,  life,  man, 
morals  religion,  and  the  future. 

The  Old  Bible  has  two  purls:  one  tells  of  God,  the  origin 
of  the  heavens,  the  earth,  life,  one  race  of  men,  their  morals, 
religion,  future  life;  the  other  is  mainly  a  later  addition 
limited  mostly  to  morals,  religion,  and  the  future  life.  One 
is  styled  "Old  Testament"  (or  Covenant)  ;  and  one  "New 
Testament." 

The  "Old  Testament"  was  the  old  Science,  or  fundamental 
authoritative   knowledge   for  alxnit   4(K)  years   B.   C.     The 

191 


192    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

"Nexu  Testament"  was  a  little  newer  Science  (on  Ethics, 
Sociology,  and  Religion.)  The  newest  Testament  or  the  New 
Bible  is  the  newest  Science  about  all  these  and  other  themes, 
developed  mostly  during  the  last  150  years. 

The  New  Bible  has  no  old  testament.  It  might  be  perhaps 
called  a  "New  Old  and  New  Testament."  It  is  simply  the 
body  of  Modern  Science,  or  the  latest  edition  of  man's 
verified  knowledge.  It  is  a  fuller  revelation  of  "God's 
truths"  with  less  intermixture  of  error.  The  books  are 
written  by  men  of  broader  knowledge  with  a  keener  sense 
of  the  true. 

The  New  Bible  has  many  versions,  and  is  continually 
appearing  in  new  editions.  No  edition  can  be  so  complete 
as  to  be  fully  up  to  date.  The  fields  of  knowledge  are  vast, 
and  are  yearly  becoming  more  so.  The  New  differs  con- 
spicuously from  the  ancient  and  traditional  Bibles  in  being 
a  progressive  revelation.  Neither  its  writers — nor  its 
readers  for  them,  claim  infallibility;  but  they  are  striving 
to  be  truthful  and  honest.  They  insist  upon  absolute  Free- 
dom. They  use  this  to  get  at  the  Truth.  The  truth  applied 
to  life  is  Character. 

The  Titles  of  the  Books,  may  be  stated  as  follows.  (A 
few  of  the  many  writers'  names  are  added.  They  will  be 
helpful  and  suggestive  of  others.) 

Book  I.  The  wonders  and  laws  of  the  Heavens — 
Astronomy  according  to  Lockyer,  Proctor,  Langley,  Fla- 
marion,  Newcomb,  Ball,  Young,  et  al. 

Book  II.  The  formation  and  development  of  the  Globe- 
World  we  live  on — Geography  and  Geology  according  to 
Lyell,  Geikie,  Reclus,  Bonny,  LeConte,  Davis,  Hinman,  et  al. 

Book  III,  The  masses,  molecules,  elements — the  Energy 
forming  the  substratum  of  the  World— Physics  and  Chem- 
istry according  to  Tyndall,  Helmholtz,  Mendola,  Maxwell, 
Thompson,  Crookes,  Dolbear,  et  al. 

Book  IV.  The  Life  that  has  evolved  from  moneron  to 
man  in  perhaps   100,000,000  years — Biology  according  to 


THE  NEW  BTBLE  193 

Darwin,  Haeckel,  Wallace,  Huxley,  Spencer,  Cope,  Martin, 
Sherrington,  Loeb,  et  al. 

Book  V.  The  evolutionary  synopsis  of  Human  Origin 
and  Uprise — Anthropology  according  to  Peschel,  Quartre- 
fages,  Lubbock,  Brinton,  Tylor,  Ratzel,  Mason,  Starr, 
Chamberlain,  Drummond,  Keith,  Keane,  Osborne,  et  al. 

Book  VI.  The  evolution  of  Languages  and  Literature 
from  the  cries  and  gestures,  the  babbling  and  vocal  yearn- 
ings, the  pictographic  scrawls  and  final  abstract  scribblings 
of  early  and  later  man  in  his  ceaseless  strivings  to  communi- 
cate his  conscious  states  to  his  fellows — Philology  according 
to  Bopp,  Sleicher,  Fr.  Mueller,  Max  Mueller,  Sayce,  Boeckh, 
Delbrueck,  Whitney,  et  al. 

Book  VII.  The  growing  and  expanding  sensibility  of  the 
original  protoplasm  into  the  intelligent,  volitional  Mind  of 
man — Psychology  according  to  Spencer,  Wundt,  Sully, 
Ribot,  Ladd,  Romanes,  James,  Flechsig,  Barker,  Mills, 
Campbell,  et  al. 

Book  VIII.  The  laborious  disentanglement  of  Human 
Career  through  buried  savagery,  barbarisms,  and  civiliza- 
tions, througn  myth  and  legend,  through  tradition  and 
forgery,  through  chronicles  and  government  records — 
Archaeology  and  History  according  to  Gibbon,  Layard, 
Rawlinson,  Boucher  de  Perthes,  von  Ranke,  Brugsch, 
Mommsen,  Lecky,  White,  Fiske,  Fisher,  Wells,  et  al. 

Book  IX.  The  Sanctions  and  Motives  of  conscious  life, 
subordinating  self-centered  impulses  and  adjusting  conduct 
to  care-taking  and  cooperative  ends — Ethics  and  Sociology 
according  to  Bagehot,  Maine,  Westermarck,  Geddes,  Thom- 
son, Lecky,  Spencer,  Marx,  Lester  F.  Ward,  Loria,  Ferri, 
Ross,  et  al. 

Book  X.  The  intenser  Expression  of  the  harmonies 
which  man  has  sensed  and  understood  from  Nature  in  her 
various  realms — Esthetics  (including  Music,  Painting, 
Sculpture,  Architecture,  Literature)  according  to  Arnold, 
Symonds,  Ruskin,  Tolstoi,  Morris,  Raymond,  Winchester, 
et  al. 

Book  XL     Man's  Aspirations  as  seen  in  his  search  for 


194     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

(iitd  (luring  his  quarter  of  a  million  years;  from  animism, 
fctichism,  and  polydemonism  through  polytheism  and  an- 
thropomoi-phic  monotheism  to  scientific,  spiritual  monism — 
Rclig'wlogy  {or  Eusebiology)  according  to  Tiele,  Mueller, 
Spencer,  Fiske,  Everett,  LeConte,  Powell,  Savage,  Crookes, 
Kelvin,  et  al. 

These  seem  to  be  natural  divisions  of  knowledge  at  this 
date.  If  the  field  becomes  broader  by  new  discoveries,  new 
books  will  be  added  to  this  present  New  Bible.  Most  of 
the  books  are  already  vast,  and  each  is  divided  and  sub- 
divided. 

Even  the  study  of  the  Old  Bible  falls  in  as  a  part  of  the 
New.  Only  by  Archaeology,  History,  and  Philology  is  the 
Old  any  longer  regarded  as  intelligible.  It  is  this  method 
of  Science,  applied  to  all  previously  regarded  sacred  things, 
which  has  discovered  their  natural  order  of  development 
and  their  larger,  deeper,  sacred  significance. 

Dr.  Andrew  D.  White  says :  "The  revelations  made  by 
the  sciences  which  most  directly  deal  with  the  history  of 
man  all  converge  in  the  truth,  that  during  the  early  stages 
of  this  evolution  moral  and  spiritual  teachings  must  be  in- 
closed in  myth,  legend,  and  parable  ...  In  making  this  truth 
clear.  Science  will  give  to  religion  far  more  than  it  will 
take  away,  for  it  will  throw  new  life  and  light  into  all  sacred 
literature." 

If  it  ever  was  important  to  have  high  authority  in  know- 
ledge of  the  greatest  topics,  it  is  now  of  supremest  import- 
ance to  know  the  elements  of  this  New  Bible.  It  will  be 
education ;  it  will  be  religion.  Could  we  do  this  as  piously 
as  our  fathers  and  mothers  learned  the  Old  one  in  their 
day,  we  should  make  life  safe  and  progressive.  It  is  in 
reality  the  same  disgrace  not  to  know  the  leading  teachings 
of  the  New  Bible  in  this  age  that  it  was  not  to  know  the 
Old  Bible  in  days  of  old. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 
THE  NEW  BIBLE:  BOOK  I* 

THE  HEAVENS    (aSTRONOMY) 

"And  yonder  Lights!   .  .  .  O  tireless-swinging  Orbs! 
Not  in  a  trillion  years  one  hair's  breadth  free 
From  paths  the  Energy  which  all  absorbs 
Marked  out  from  vast  eternities  for  thee! 

A  "Bible"  ye  indeed!     Wherein  I  scan 
Forces  which  never  tire,  retrace  nor  bend; 
From  which  I  solve,  or  seem  to  solve,  for  Man, 
The  Law  on-urging  him  to  some  fine  end." 

JAMES  H.  WEST 

"But  one  truth  must  ever  grow  clearer — the  truth  that  there  is 
an  Inscrutable  Existence  everywhere  manifested,  to  which  he 
(man)  can  neither  find  nor  conceive  either  beginning  or  end. 
Among  the  mysteries  which  become  the  more  mysterious,  the 
more  they  are  thought  about,  there  will  remain  the  one  absolute 
certainty,  that  he  is  ever  in  the  presence  of  an  Infinite  and 
Eternal  Energy,  from  which  all  things  proceed." 

—HERBERT  SPENCER 

Our  fathers  went  to  the  blacksmith  to  have  their  tires 
reset.  We  go  to  the  auto-supply  house.  They  bought  their 
plows  and  sickles  from  the  village  store  or  hardware  shop. 
We  buy  our  tractors  and  reapers  from  international  har- 
vester companies.  They  read  Genesis  to  find  out  about 
creation. 


•  Illustration  of  the  character  of  "The  New  Bible"  will  be 
here  given  in  two  chapters  covering  a  brief  survey  of  only  the 
first  two  books,  Astronomy  and  Geology. 

195 


196     A    RPXEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

Few  people  iidw  living  would  have  the  curiosity  to  inquire 
about  the  bespangled  dome  above  their  heads,  without  at  the 
same  time  having  the  sense  to  know  that  their  questions  must 
be  answered  by  the  science  of  Astronomy.  By  such  acts, 
it  is  acknowledged  that  the  "Old  Bible"  teachings  about  the 
sky  are  superseded.  Our  trust  has  been  transferred  from 
the  first  book  of  the  Old  Bible  to  the  first  book  of  the  New 
Bible — Modern  Astronomy. 

Doubtless  for  a  hunched  thousand  years  man  has  had 
mental  ability  enough  to  admire  the  stars  and  to  speculate 
more  or  less  about  them.  Before  he  began  to  write  history, 
he  became  so  impressed  with  their  importance  that  he  con- 
ceived for  them  a  fateful  or  providential  participation  in 
all  the  affairs  of  his  own  self-centered  life.  His  musings 
and  speculations  gradually  developed  into  a  system  of  star- 
lore  and  astrological  rules  for  the  universal  guidance  of 
his  conduct.  When  he  vvould  know  beforehand  the  advisa- 
bility of  any  contemplated  undertaking,  he  consulted  or  put 
the  stars  together,  i.  e.,  he  "con-sidered"  (from  con  together 
and  sidera  a  star  group).  And  if  his  undertaking  turned 
out  badly,  it  was  because  it  had  been  ill-starred,  and  he 
named  it  a  "dis-aster"  (from  dis  wrong  or  opposing  and 
aster  a  star).  By  and  by,  he  named  the  month  and  the 
names  of  the  months,  the  day  and  the  names  of  the  days 
after  his  gods  in  the  sky.  The  moon's  circuit  became  "a 
moon,"  "a  mond"  (German),  or  a  month.  A  sun's  journey 
he  called  a  "dies"  (Latin),  i.  e.,  a  day  or  a  sun.  The  week 
came  from  the  fourth  of  a  moon,  and  the  days  of  the  week 
get  their  names  from  the  seven  greater  planets,  including 
the  sun.  The  more  he  thought  of  those  bright  faces  in  the 
night  skies,  the  more  their  mystery  baffled  him ;  till  finally 
these  weird  creatures  of  his  untrained  imagination  became 
veritable  tyrants  over  his  life  from  birth  to  death.  His 
ignorance  was  the  mother  of  superstition,  and  his  abstract 
theoretical  superstitions  peopled  his  mind  with  base  and 
abject  fears.  Eclipses,  comets,  variable  stars,  and  the  or- 
dinary movements  of  the  planets  often  created  the  most 
widespread  terror.     Tens  of  thousands  and  probably  mil- 


THE  NEW  BIBLE:  BOOK  I  197 

lions  of  lives  have  been  sacrificed  or  blasted  by  the  stupid 
and  barbarous  behefs  held  as  to  the  fateful  influence  of 
those  unaccountable  specks  above. 

But  there  came  at  last  a  break  zvith  tradition.  There  was 
born  a  Copernicus  who  preferred  observation  to  tradition 
and  speculation ;  and  since  him,  a  host  of  others,  by  honest 
search  systematically  conducted,  have  tried  to  be  square 
with  the  facts.  They  have  learned  that  our  earth  is  a  star, 
and  that  the  stars,  those  "patines  of  bright  gold,"  are  vast 
worlds  and  systems  soaring  through  immensity.  They  have 
measured  their  distances,  have  spanned  and  weighed  their 
masses,  and  have  discovered  a  hundred  things  about  their 
physical  conditions.  They  have  exploded  that  grossest  of 
errors,  the  Geocentric  notion.  They  have  followed  the  track 
of  the  earth  and  traced  it  round  the  sun.  They  have  done 
the  like  for  all  the  wandering  stars,  and  in  this  process  have 
discovered  a  Heliocentric  or  Solar  System.  In  doing  this, 
new  problems  have  arisen,  and  the  solution  of  them  has  led 
to  the  revealing  of  two  other  vast  worlds  (Uranus  and 
Neptune)  and  some  hundreds  of  lesser  ones  (the  Asteroids). 

The  Sun  himself  has  received  a  great  amount  of  attention. 
The  ancient  notion  of  his  twelve-mile  distance  and  the  Mid- 
dle-Age estimate  of  2,000  miles  has  grown  to  an  accurate 
measurement  of  something  over  93,000,000  miles!  His 
shining  face,  imaged  as  only  a  yard  or  two  across,  is  found 
to  be  the  incandescent  disk  of  a  molten  globe  866,000  miles 
in  diameter — a  volume  equal  to  over  1,300,000  worlds  like 
this.  And  science  by  its  instruments  (the  telescope,  spec- 
troscope, and  camera),  has  been  able  to  penetrate  that  awful 
light  and  heat  and  find  out  the  very  nature  of  the  solar  stuff. 

The  Moon,  too,  has  ceased  to  be  an  object  of  superstition 
(at  least,  among  the  enlightened).  Her  course  has  been 
determined  with  profoundest  accuracy,  the  phenomena  and 
times  of  eclipse  have  been  reduced  to  fractional  exactness, 
and  even  the  problems  of  lunar  attraction  and  the  tides  fill 
a  book  with  abstruse  mathematical  demonstrations. 

With  newer  and  better  instruments  of  search,  Astronomy 
looks  beyond  the  six  billion  mile  circle  of  our  own  solar 


198    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

system  and  studies  the  neighboring  suns.  It  finds  them  of 
a  kind  with  our  majestic  Day-source.  Our  sun  is  but  a 
near-by  star.  The  stars  are  but  far-off  suns.  In  the  vast 
scale  of  suns,  some  are  larger,  some  smaller;  some  are 
younger,  some  older.  So  far  away  are  these  interesting 
neighbors  from  our  little  quick  whirling  world,  that  the  light 
of  the  nearest  is  over  three  and  a  half  years  old  as  it  comes 
flashing  into  our  eyes.  And  though  light-pulses  of  the  inter- 
vening ether  show  the  bewildering  speed  of  one  hundred 
and  eighty-six  thousand  miles  a  second,  yet  the  glimmer  of 
the  faintest  far  off  specks  must  have  left  those  ponderous 
orbs  many  thousands  of  years  ago ! 

To  the  wisest  Ancients,  the  nuniher  of  the  stars  was  less 
than  6,000,  while  their  best  star-map  contains  but  1200. 
Modem  astronomy  with  its  gigantic  eye  (the  telescope) 
and  sensitive  retina  (the  camera  plate)  has  made  a  celestial 
map  of  probably  one  hundred  million  stars!  And  it  is 
practically  sure  that  around  each  of  these  are  many  times 
one  hundred  millions  of  worlds  which  sooner  or  later  pass 
through  stages  analagous  to  those  of  our  own  precious 
earth. 

In  the  depths  of  immensity  it  finds  yet  other  hosts  of 
wonders,  all  unknown  to  former  ages  and  so  unique  as  to 
be  baffling  for  want  of  analogies  in  any  realm  of  terrestrial 
experience.  Centers  of  double,  triple,  and  even  of  sextuple 
type  are  seen.  Polaris,  Sirius,  Rigel,  Algol,  and  many 
others  are  twin  systems.  Theta  in  Orion  is  a  sextette  of 
suns  in  one  super-splendid  whorl.  Suns  of  every  rainbow 
hue  lend  their  various  beauties  to  the  celestial  panorama. 
Sirius  is  white,  Capella  yellow,  Betelgeuse  red.  Castor  green, 
and  Lyra  blue.  Gamma  in  Andromeda  is  a  triple  system 
of  one  orange-red  and  two  emerald-green  suns.  Psi  in 
Cassiopeia  is  another  triple  group  of  suns,  red,  blue,  and 
green. 

Even  their  periods  of  revolution  around  each  other  have 
in  numerous  cases  been  measured  by  methods  most  ingen- 
ious. Algol's  companion  is  a  dark  or  burnt  out  sun,  yet 
their  mutual  period  is  known  to  be  two  and  one-half  days 


THE  NEW  BIBLE:  BOOK  I  199 

around  an  orbit  of  some  eleven  million  miles.  Mizar  (at 
the  bend  in  the  big  dipper-handle)  is  a  double  whose  period 
is  one  hundred  and  four  days,  covering  an  orbit  of  over 
five  hundred  million  miles,  and  at  a  speed  of  about  fifty 
miles  a  second!  This  the  new  Astronomy  has  learned, 
though  the  double  character  of  the  system  is  invisible  with 
even  the  most  powerful  telescope!  The  process  is  that 
known  as  spectroscopic  analysis. 

I  will  mention  one  last  wonder,  viz.,  that  of  the 
Nebulae.  Since  the  higher  telescopic  aid  came  into  use, 
Astronomy  has  recorded  many  thousands  of  cloud-like 
patches  of  varying  form  and  grandeur  in  different  regions 
of  the  Universe.  None  of  these  were  known  to  the  Ancient 
World.  Those  in  Andromeda  and  Orion  are  barely  visible 
to  the  keenest  eyes.  These  world-clouds  shine  by  their  own 
light  and  are  of  great  variety  of  forms,  as  seen  from  our 
home-star.  Some  resemble  rings,  others  spirals,  double- 
spirals,  fans,  dumb-bells,  and  so  forth.  Their  dimensions 
are  vast.  The  one  in  Andromeda  fills  as  much  as  seven 
times  the  orbit  of  Neptune — and  even  this  is  nearly  six 
billions  of  miles  across !  By  the  spectroscope  they  are  found 
to  consist  of  substances  similar  to  the  other  orbs  of  space, 
only  in  rarified  conditions. 

Studying  all  worlds  with  the  suggestions  which  these 
fleecy  fire-mists  offer,  and  taking  into  consideration  other 
hints  found  in  our  Sun  and  his  system,  man  has  reached 
what  seems  in  magnitude  to  be  the  climax  of  his  mental 
achievements  in  the  all-comprehensive  world-theories,  the 
so-called  "Nebular"  and  the  "Planetcsimal"  Hypotheses. 
The  first  was  independently  suggested  by  both  Kant  (1755) 
and  the  Elder  Herschel,  and  again  independently  developed 
on  a  mathematical  basis  by  Laplace  in  1796.  By  it  each 
system  was  once  an  immeasurable,  contracting,  whirling, 
fiery,  cloufllike  ball.  Its  axial  revolution  caused  polar 
flattening  and  consequent  equatorial  bulging,  till  finally  huge, 
rolling  rings  of  the  ever  shrinking  vafX)r  broke  away.  Then 
slowly  these  monstrous  annular  masses  drew  together  into 
cometary  form  or  polywog  worlds,  the  tails  being  ultimately 


200    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

absorbed  in  the  completed  spheres.  This  grand  conception 
was  Httle  modified  for  a  hundred  years,  but  has  now  several 
suggested  additions  and  modifications. 

These  are  man's  modern  understanding  of  the  first  chapter 
in  the  Story  of  Creation. 

They  arc  a  few — only  a  few — of  the  wonders  revealed 
in  the  First  Book  of  the  New  Bible.  A  hundred  laws — I 
would  I  could  rehearse  them — from  that  same  Creative 
Energy  have  come  with  these  marvelous  facts.  It  was  the 
Prophet  Newton  who,  from  the  analogy  of  a  falling  apple, 
figured  out  and  finally  demonstrated  the  application  of  the 
King  of  all  laws  (gravitation)  to  the  moon,  the  sun,  and 
eventually  to  the  whole  universe.  Kepler  and  others  have 
given  us  the  most  detailed  analyses  of  the  facts  and  have 
found  other  laws  the  difficult  character  of  which  will  make 
their  names  both  eminent  and  dear  to  all  succeeding  genera- 
tions. 

Altogether  this  long,  grand  strain  of  work  has  revealed 
a  Universe,  that  Whole  of  which  our  world  has  always  been 
but  a  tiny  part.  It  has  dispelled  the  narrow  illusion  that 
man  lived  on  a  little  flat  earth  with  a  little  sea  in  the  middle 
(Mare-medi-terra-neum)  and  a  "firmament"  of  waters  all 
around  and  above  it.  It  has  shown  this  Universe  as  a  unity 
of  Material  with  a  unity  of  Law,  held  by  a  unity  of  Power 
in  a  unity  of  Being.  Throughout  the  blue  concave  it  has 
revealed  an  Omnipresent,  All-pervading  Spirit-Energy. 
Thus,  for  the  first  time  in  history,  has  religion  been  fur- 
nished with  a  Deity  at  once  real  and  of  illimitable  creative 
might. 


When  I  am  overmatched  by  petty  cares 

And  things  of  earth  loom  large  and  look  to  be 
Of  moment,  how  it  sooths  and  comforts  me 

To  step  into  the  night  and  feel  the  airs 

Of  heaven  fan  my  cheek,  and,  best  of  all, 
Gaze  up  into  those  all-uncharted  seas 
Where  swim  the  stately  planets!  such  as  these 

Make  mortal  fret  seem  slight  and  temporal. 

I  muse  on  what  of  life  may  stir  among 
Those  spaces  knowing  naught  of  metes  or  bars; 
Undreamed  of  dreams  played  on  outmost  stars. 

And  lyrics  by  archangels  grandly  sung. 

I  grow  familiar  with  the  solar  runes 
And  comprehend  of  worlds  the  mystic  birth, — 
Ringed  Saturn,  Mars,  whose  fashion  apes  the  earth, 

And  Jupiter,  the  giant,  with  his  moons. 

Then  dizzy  with  the  unspeakable  sights  above, 
Rebuked  by  vast  on  vast,  my  puny  heart 
Is  greatened  for  its  transitory  part, 

My  trouble  merged  in  wonder  and  in  love. 

RICHARD  BURTON 


201 


CHAPTER  XIX 
THE  NEW  BIBLE:  BOOK  II 

THE  EARTH    (GEOGRAPHY  AND  GEOLOGY) 

"The  present  state  of  the  Solar  System  is  a  living  picture  of 
the  entire  history  of  a  single  planet.  From  the  Sun's  fire-mist 
to  ring-girt  Saturn;  from  Saturn  to  storm  beaten  Jupiter;  from 
Jupiter  to  the  sunny  summer-time  of  our  own  planet;  from  Earth 
to  autumn-browned  Mars;  and  from  Mars  to  the  wintry  silence 
and  desolation  of  the  dark  gulches  of  the  Moon, — there  is  a 
series  of  stages  that  carries  the  thought  back  into  the  eternity 
long  passed,  as  well  as  onward  into  the  measureless  depths  of 
the  future  and  confers  upon  human  intelligence  a  sort  of  exemp- 
tion from  the  limitations  of  finite  existence." 

—PROP.  ALEXANDER  WINCHELL 

"This  Earth  was  doubtless  once  a  glowing  star,  like  the  sun. 
Its  crust  is  only  the  ashes  and  cinders  of  that  fearful  conflagra- 
lion.  The  rocks  are  all  burnt  bodies.  The  atmosphere  is  only 
the  gas  left  over  after  the  fuel  was  all  consumed.  Every  organic 
object  has  been  rescued  by  plants  and  *he  sunbeam  from  the 
grasp  of  oxygen."— JOEL  DORMAN  STEELE,  Ph.  D. 

One  of  my  college  classmates  came  from  a  small  town 
ill  Illinois.  He  had  a  blind  brother  who  chummed  a  good 
deal  with  a  dull-witted  village  loafer.  One  summer  this 
fellow  made  a  trip  (the  first  in  his  life)  to  Peoria,  some 
seventy-five  miles  away.  After  his  return  he  had  much  to 
say  to  his  blind  comrade  about  the  wonders  of  his  travels. 
My  college  friend  overheard  this:  "I  tell  you,  Merv,  this 
world  is  a  pretty  big  place.  If  it's  as  big  every  way  as  it  is 
down  toward  Peory,  it's  a  mighty  big  world !" 

Primitive  man  tvas  timid.  Curiosity  anrl  the  venturesome 
spirit  have  been  of  slow  growth.     Even  had  he  possessed 

202 


THE  NEW  BIBLE :  BOOK  II  203 

this  spirit  in  great  degree  the  necessities  of  food  and  protec- 
tion would  have  made  the  work  of  exploring  the  world  but 
a  slow  process.  To  go  far  from  his  cave  or  cliff  home 
involved  peril.  If  night  overtook  him  at  a  distance,  the 
chances  were  he  would  fall  a  victim  to  the  prowling  car- 
nivora  or  the  inclement  weather.  There  were  no  late  trains, 
good  roads,  electric  lights,  horses  and  carriages,  or  automo- 
biles, nor  even  the  protection  of  fire-arms  to  aid  his  safe 
homegetting.  Hence  his  geographical  interest  was  small. 
Danger  was  so  imminent  from  both  nature  and  life  forces, 
that  his  imagination  pictured  it  large.  Stories  of  super- 
natural goblins  and  demons  made  terror  more  terrible. 

We  will  not  wonder  then  that  man's  interest  in  regions 
of  the  world  beyond  his  neighborhood  had  to  wait  the  time 
when  he  could  go  with  protection  and  food  supply.  For 
this  he  must  have  animal  help — camels,  elephants,  oxen, 
asses,  horses,  and,  later,  engines  to  carry  the  burdens,  and 
dogs  to  guard  off  the  foes.  It  has  been  a  long  and  weary 
way  as  we  look  back  over  it  from  today.  But  we  must  also 
bear  in  mind  that  the  motive  was  always  booty.  Until 
recent  times,  expeditions  have  never  been  made  for  the 
general  increase  of  knowledge,  and  are  even  yet  seldom  so 
undertaken. 

Before  men  would  or  could  reduce  their  knowledge  of 
country  seen  to  practical  advantage  for  future  experience, 
they  must  also  have  arrived  at  the  stage  of  writing  and 
elementary  drawing.  At  first  and  for  long,  these  must  have 
been  crude,  inaccurate,  and  vague ;  and  even  since  history  be- 
gan we  find  them  of  erroneous  and  most  uncertain  character. 
From  ficroditus  and  Eratosthenes  we  have  received  the 
ideas  of  the  Ancient  Greeks  as  to  the  world,  its  shape,  size, 
and  so  forth.  The  more  adventurous  Romans  understood  it 
better.  During  the  Middle  Ages  no  positive  advance  toward 
systematic  description  was  made.  A  few  roving  characters 
like  Marco-Polo  and  Sir  John  Mandeville  brought  home 
curious  and  exciting  accounts  of  far  away  lands  and  peoples 
which  served  to  rouse  interest  in  a  larger  world.  .So,  too,  the 
incessant  wars  among  the  petty  rulers,  as  well  as  the  more 


204     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

cooperative  undertaking's  known  as  the  Crusades.  This 
curiosity  cuhninated  in  the  projected  ocean  explorations  of 
the  fifteenth  century.  Portuguese  and  Spanish  mariners 
visited  Iceland  and  coasted  along  the  shores  of  Africa. 
Finally  by  Spanish  aid,  the  Italian  Columbus,  boldly  set  his 
sail  across  the  trackless  main.  His  unparalleled  success  in 
finding  half  a  world  roused  an  interest  which  spread  every- 
where, and  has  left  a  permanent  desire  to  know  all  the  earth. 
Slowly  during  the  four  centuries  there  has  been  growing 
a  description  of  the  Earth — a  Gco-graphy. 

But  Geography  was  only  description.  It  is  scarcely  yet 
science.  Its  phenomena  have  a  deeper  basis.  It  rests  upon 
the  foundation  of  the  newer  Science  of  World  Principles, 
viz.,  Geology. 

Geology  is  young,  very  young  indeed,  when  we  thing  of  its 
hoary-headed  sister  Astronomy.  Except  Astronomy,  all  the 
concrete  sciences  are  of  recent  origin.  The  early  states  of 
all  advances  were  appallingly  slow.  To  make  a  science,  a 
vast  number  of  experiences  must  be  passed,  and  even  after 
they  begin  to  be  arranged  and  systematized,  their  natural 
relations  and  laws  are  not  hastily  found.  Then  again, 
experiences  are  never  complete.  We  never  finish  any  know- 
ledge. Every  limit  finds  fields  beyond.  Gate  after  gate 
opens  into  the  farther-on.  Every  science  is  but  an  incom- 
plete excursion.  Fact  after  fact  and  principle  after  prin- 
ciple are  observed  and  settled  on  the  basis  of  previously 
settled  ones.  If  an  error  happened  to  be  taken  for  a  fact, 
then  the  way  was  barred  against  the  discovery  of  further 
facts  and  principles.  And  if  prejudice  became  so  firm  and 
dogmatic  that  it  would  not  retrace  its  steps  or  re-examine, 
there  was  the  end  to  growth  and  advance.  It  was  an 
enormous  error  of  this  kind  that  forestalled  the  increase 
of  human  knowledge  regarding  the  earth  for  over  two 
thousand  years. 

Thales,  Pythagoras,  and  Plato  thought  the  earth  was  a 
sphere.  But  this  was  regarded  by  everyone  as  a  ridiculous, 
impractical  speculation,  only  "worthy  of  a  philosopher." 
It  was  so  utterly  contradictory  to  what  the  senses  seemed 


THE  NEW  BIBLE:  BOOK  II  205 

to  teach  that  it  was  rejected  for  twenty  centuries  after  its 
proposal.  There  could  be  no  true  beginning  of  a  science 
of  the  earth  till  there  was  something  to  base  it  on.  In  other 
words,  there  must  be  a  good  start  in  the  Science  of  Worlds 
before  there  could  be  any  start  in  the  Science  of  this  World. 
Geology'  is  based  on  Astronomy.  W'hile  the  great  mistake 
was  continued  of  assuming  the  earth  as  the  flat-center  of 
all  things,  every  other  attempt  was  more  than  likely  to  lead 
to  nothing. 

But  after  Copernicus  through  the  cracks  in  his  attic  had 
caught  the  earth  in  the  act  of  going  round  the  sun,  and 
after  Columbus  had  dared  the  western  sea  and  actually 
sailed  over  its  perilous  edge,  and  after  Magellan  had  put  a 
girdle  round  the  globe  and  had  seen  the  blue  sky  from  every 
point,  and  after  Galileo  had  with  his  new  long-eye  discovered 
other  worlds  and  mountains  on  the  moon,  and  after  Newton 
had  found  the  same  laws  there  that  prevail  here,  and  after 
Herschel  had  found  nebulae  in  the  depths  of  the  star- 
studded  sky,  and  after  Laplace  had  put  all  this  together  in 
a  Cosmical  Doctrine  of  Worlds, — then  only  could  a  Science 
of  this  World  begin  with  its  details  on  a  sound  basis.  And 
sc-  we  find  it.  In  the  early  years  of  the  nineteenth  century 
the  opposing  schools  of  Mutton  and  Werner  were  disputing 
and  speculating  over  the  origin  and  formation  of  the  globe. 
At  this  juncture  came  the  great  founders  of  modern  Geology 
— Humboldt  and  Lyell. 

Once  given  the  solar  start,  the  igneous  origin,  the  forma- 
tion of  the  world  from  the  sun,  there  follows  the  contrac- 
tion of  that  world  first  into  a  cometary  body,  then  into  a 
globular  form.  This  vast  sphere  quickens  its  rotation  by 
the  process  of  its  further  contraction.  An  oblate  spheroidal 
form  results.  Radiation  of  heat  means  cooling  of  the  outer 
surface,  and  this  (at  some  2,000  degrees  F.)  began  the 
building  of  the  crust  or  floor  of  the  world.  Air,  water,  and 
mineral  matters  arrange  themselves  l)y  their  relative  gravi- 
ties. Air  and  vapors  envelop  the  globe.  O'er  all  its 
surface  lie  the  liquid  masses.     Below  is  the  slow-hardening 


2o6    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

mineral   crust.     Within   all   the   envelopes   are   the   molten 
metals  forming  the  heavy  heart  of  the  Earth.* 

Ever  and  anon,  the  great  masses  of  accumulating  gases 
(caused  hy  steam  from  water  trickling  down)  react  against 
the  increasing  crust  contraction.  Explosions,  wrinklings, 
and  upheavals  on  a  prodigious  scale  result.  Large  areas 
me  slowly  lifted  above  the  watery  coating  and  become  conti- 
nents for  future  life-dramas.  Here  and  there  through  th,e 
thinner  places  the  igneous  forces  continue  to  act  from  be- 
neath, while  the  protruded  areas  are  hoisted  into  position 
to  receive  the  action  of  atmospheric,  aqueous,  etherial,  and 
later  of  organic  forces.  These  are  the  agents,  which  by 
their  eons  of  ceaseless  action,  have  built  and  rebuilt,  and  are 
still  building  over  the  once  molten  fire-ball  into  a  world 
for  higher  and  higher  life.  The  hissing,  viscid,  cooling 
granite-crust  must  be  broken  and  crumbled,  ground  and 
reground;  must  be  washed  and  worn,  sifted  and  silted, 
smoothed  and  pressed,  compounded  and  recompounded.  In 
Archaean  time,  protoplasm  was  one  of  these  results — 
perhaps  in  the  form  of  Dr.  Dawson's  "Eozoon."  From 
then  onward,  the  process  of  better  preparation  and  the 
progress  of  life  have  run  parallel.  Immensities  of  energy 
have  conspired  and  brought  about  a  world.  The  very  vast- 
ness  hints  to  us  the  price  of  the 

"far  off  Divine  event 
Toward  which  the  whole  creation  moves." 

In  a  couple  of  verses  Hattie  Tyng  Griswold  has  sung  the 
Creation  strain: 

"The  sun  must  be  evolved 
The  world  to  swing  in  space. 
Ages  of  coal  and  glacier 
Prepare  the  soil  to  place, 


•  It  matters  not  for  our  thesis  here  whether  the  Planetesimal 
or  some  other  hypothesis  be  transposed  to  take  the  place  of  the 
Nebular  Theory.  On  any  basis,  the  Biblical  Creation  scheme  is 
set  aside  forever. 


THE  NEW  BIBLE :  BOOK  II  207 

Eons  the  sun  must  shine 

To  make  a  fitting  air, 
Millenniums  of  time 

Must  make  its  food  their  care. 
Reptiles  and  mammals  grow 

To  die  and  add  their  part, 
Rocks  must  be  ground,  peat  burned, 

All  vegetation  start. 
Ere  o'er  a  waiting  world 

God  could  in  ordered  way 
A  rose  swing  on  its  stalk. 

To  bloom  but  for  a  day." 

I  have  but  barely  entered  upon  that  part  of  our  World- 
Science  known  as  Dynamical  Geology.  And  this  is  hardly 
a  seventh  part  of  the  great  field  of  knowledge  now  compre- 
hended within  the  Science  of  the  Earth.  It  is  my  business 
here  merely  to  cite  a  chapter  from  one  division  of  this  great 
book  of  revelation.  Another,  the  Physiographical,  treats 
the  form,  magnitude,  and  so  forth  of  the  surface  character- 
istics of  the  earth;  another,  the  Petro graphical  discusses  the 
material  of  the  crust ;  another  the  Petrogenetic,  the  origin 
and  constitution  of  the  rocks;  another,  the  Architectonic  or 
Structural,  the  strata,  their  kinds  and  arrangements ;  another, 
the  Stratigraphical,  classifies  the  rocks  in  the  order  of  their 
appearance,  and  interprets  the  events  of  which  they  in  their 
varied  forms  are  the  record ;  and  lastly,  Historical  or 
Palaeontological  Geology  studies  the  evolution  of  the  Globe 
and  of  the  past  life  upon  it  by  the  plant  and  animal  fossils 
embodied  in  the  strata. 

It  is  grand ;  and  yet  it  is  simple.  The  leading  features 
of  it  all  are  easy  to  read.  He  who  learns  the  alphabet  of 
this  holy  book  will  find  its  words  of  instruction  on  every 
road  and  in  every  field  and  hill.  It  is  the  love  of  the  wisdom 
which  it  teaches  which  has  cast  out  the  terror  men  once 
continually  felt  before  its  gigantic  phenomena.  From  time 
immemorial  they  have  attributed  to  gods  and  demons  the 
terrific  activities  known  as  earthquakes,  volcanoes,  tides, 
floods,  storms,  winds,  lightnings,  and  so  forth.     They  have 


2o8    A    RKCEIVKRSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

regarded  them  now  as  vengeful  dealings,  now  as  righteous 
judgments  of  extramundane  beings.  Or  becoming  sceptical 
of  these,  they  beheld  tliem  only  as  the  wild  erratic  move- 
ments of  blind  and  aimless  forces.  But  in  this  larger  view 
of  Science  the  old  horror-based  notions  are  turning  into  ad- 
miration and  love  of  fact  and  law.  llie  love  is  turning  out 
the  fear.  The  world  is  seen  as  natural  and  the  forces  are 
innate.  They  are  the  titanic  workings  of  the  Divine  Energy 
in  its  magnificent  world-building  processes.  Man  finds  him- 
self relatively  inconspicuous.  He  sees  that  one  of  his  func- 
tions is  not  that  of  parleying  with  imaginary  gods  about  the 
constitution  and  government  of  a  world,  but  rather  the  laws 
of  Divine  Immanence,  and  the  adjustment  of  his  life  to  the 
conditions  of  his  environments.  He  is  learning  to  lay  the 
blame  for  his  ills  not  altogether  on  "natural  forces,"  but 
increasingly  to  his  selfish  passions,  conceited  prejudices,  and 
beastly  inertia.  He  has  discovered  that  the  once  "unavoid- 
able calamities"  coming  from  Nature's  giant  thrusts,  are 
partly  avoidable,  and  that  if  he  can  rid  himself  of  the  woes 
he  wrecks  upon  himself  in  the  wholesale  butcheries  which 
he  ever  tries  to  mollify  by  calling  them  "manly  contests  in 
war,"  he  will  then  only  know  how  much  life  is  worth  the 
living.  He  is  realizing  that  the  fevers  and  plagues  which 
he  once  classed  with  other  "Providential  inflictions"  are 
largely  the  natural  misery  resulting  from  unnecessary 
ignorance.  Indeed,  so  large  a  portion  of  his  ills  he  now 
knows  are  ignorantly  borne  or  self  inflicted  that  he  is  already 
doubting  all  his  former  views. 

Through  the  study  of  worlds  men  are  coming  to  think  of 
God  as  illimitable  Spirit-Energy  filling  the  stellar  abysses. 
By  this  only  are  we  able  to  say  Universe.  This  is  Cause 
and  Essence  in  Oneness  of  Being.  It  possesses  cosmic 
attributes.  It  is  manifest  in  all  things,  in  all  laws,  in  all 
phenomena — not  more  in  the  greatest  than  in  the  least. 
Science  shows  us  that  all  thoughts  extending  human  quali- 
ties to  Nature,  about  manlike  trinities  and  social  pantheons, 
are  speculations  of  childlike  minds.  They  are  on  the  way 
toward  knowing  the  great  World  and  the  Force  and  Law 


THE  NEW  BIBLE:  BOOK  II  209 

that  bind  it  like  a  whirling  drop  as  part  of  an  infinite  realm. 
Only  by  Science  have  we  learned  how  this  world-drop  has 
grown;  how  it  has  brought  forth  life;  how  it  has  evolved 
that  life  from  moneron  to  man;  how,  ever  and  all  the  way, 
the  intellectually  and  morally  higher  have  steadily  super- 
seded the  lower;  how  in  man  they  became  dominant  influ- 
ences; how  in  man  they  are  steadily  gaining;  how  beauty  is 
found  in  all  aspects  and  all  realms ;  how  things  once  thought 
to  be  curses,  under  man's  advancing  knowledge,  come  to 
serve  useful  ends  in  world  formation  and  extension;  how, 
more  and  more,  as  man  learns  the  facts,  he  sees  everywhere 
a  cosmic  grandeur  beyond  his  ken. 

By  all  these.  Science  has  revealed  thus  much  of  the  nature 
of  the  Power  from  which  the  universe  flows;  Infinity, 
Eternity,  Etheric  Substances,  Might,  Beauty,  and  a  hundred 
laws  of  the  ever  changing  order.  And  the  climax  of  all ; 
man  is  learning  that  the  secret  of  the  best  life  consists  in 
rapidly  conforming  himself  in  every  way  to  the  ever  change- 
able environment.  By  this  he  is  made  strong.  In  learning 
and  obeying  these  laws  he  finds  freedom.  In  reverent  phrase 
Tennyson  has  put  it : 

"Our  wills  are  ours;   we  know  not  how; 
Our  wills  are  ours,  to  make  them  Thine." 

More  than  any  others  the  leaders  of  modern  thought  have 
been  students  of  this  great  Nature.  They  see  in  it  not  the 
corrupt  and  debased  matter  of  the  old  theology,  but  the 
manifestation  and  the  very  essence  of  the  only  real  "God". 
They  see  not  the  old  time  "vale  of  tears,"  but  as  yet  the 
only  celestial  life-star.  They  see  through  Nature  thus 
broadly  comprehended,  the  God  the  ages  have  been  striving 
to  know.  (Though  it  may  not  prove  to  possess  the  attri- 
butes they  humanly  clothed  it  with.)  It  was  always  at  the 
very  door  of  their  senses ;  only  too  great  for  their  faint 
and  undiscerning  vision.  And  this  larger  view  is  kindling 
their  souls  to  a  devotion  as  much  greater  as  their  insight  is 
broader  and  deeper. 


2IO    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

NOTE— These  two  chapters,  XVIII  and  XIX,  are  intended  as 
samples  giving  the  synopsis  or  gist  of  two  books  of  The  New 
Bible  us  outlined  in  Chapter  XVII.  Any  reputable  text-book  on 
any  of  the  legitimate  sciences,  as  taught  in  the  universities, 
is  a  compendium  guiding  one  safely  to  that  field  of  man's  know- 
ledge about  the  universe.  There  are  no  other  reliable  guides. 
Every  educated  person  will  acknowledge  this. 


The  one  Life  thrilled  the  star-dust  through 

In  nebulous  masses  whirled, 
Until,  globed  like  a  drop  of  dew. 

Shone  out  a  new-made  world. 

The  one  Life  on  the  ocean  shore, 

Through  primal  ooze  and  slime. 
Crept  slowly  on  from  less  to  more 

Along  the  ways  of  time. 

The  one  Life  in  the  jungles  old, 

From  lowly,  creeping  things, 
Did  ever  some  new  form  unfold, — 

Swift  feet  or  soaring  wings. 

The  one  Life  all  the  ages  through 

Pursued  its  wondrous  plan. 
Till,  as  the  tree  of  promise  grew. 

It  blossomed  into  man. 

The  one  Life  reacheth  onward  still! 

As  yet  no  eye  may  see 
The  far-off  fact  man's  dream  fulfil, — 

The  glory  yet  to  be. 

MINOT  J.  SAVAGE 


211 


PART   FIVE 

THE    "INSCRUTABLE    MYSTERIES" 

SOLVED 


CHAPTER  XX 
THE  PROBLEM  OF  EVIL 

In  Genesis  second  and  third  chapters  we  have  the  most 
notorious  myth  of  all  the  world: 

"And  the  Lord  God  took  the  man,  and  put  him  in  the 
garden  of  Eden  to  dress  it  and  keep  it.  And  the  Lord  God 
commanded  the  man,  saying,  of  every  tree  of  the  garden 
thou  mayest  freely  eat;  but  of  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of 
good  and  evil,  thou  shalt  not  eat  of  it :  for  in  the  day  that 
thou  eatest  thereof  thou  shalt  surely  die."  Then  some  days 
later  this  Lord  God  made  a  woman  out  of  man's  spare  rib. 
It  was  not  long  till  she  was  gossiping  with  the  serpent,  (who 
for  some  reason  or  other  had  developed  a  grudge  against 
the  "Lord  God").  The  serpent  told  her,  "Ye  shall  not 
surely  die,  for  God  doth  know  that  in  the  day  ye  eat  thereof, 
then  your  eyes  shall  be  opened,  and  ye  shall  be  as  gods, 
knowing  good  and  evil.  And  when  the  woman  saw  that  the 
tree  was  good  for  food,  and  that  it  was  pleasant  to  the  eyes, 
and  a  tree  to  be  desired  to  make  one  wise,  she  took  of  the 
fruit  thereof,  and  did  eat,  and  gave  also  unto  her  husband 
with  her,  and  he  did  eat.  And  the  eyes  of  them  both  were 
opened,  and  they  knew  that  they  were  naked."  But  they 
did  not  die ! 

212 


THE  PROBLEM  OF  EVIL  213 

It  depends  on  which  side  one  takes  how  he  feels  toward  a 
writer  who  permits  the  serpent  (the  Devil)  to  show  his 
"Lord  God"  up  in  a  dehberate  He,  so  early  in  history.  That 
this  fairy-tale  twaddle  passed  as  sacred  fact  to  credulous 
grown-ups  for  twenty-five  hundred  years  should  be  evidence 
in  plenty  of  their  low  state  of  knowledge  and  reason. 

Good  and  evil  conduct  in  the  moral  sense,  began  when 
people  began  to  live  in  close  proximity.  Frequent  associa- 
tion compels  mutual  consideration.  The  conduct  of  others 
that  interfered  with  each  was  adjudged  by  all  as  bad.  The 
good  aroused  no  thought  with  primitive  minds. 

Evil  as  a  problem  to  be  explained  arose  when  moral  re- 
flection began.  Then  man  began  to  classify  all  actions, 
whether  in  Nature  or  among  his  fellows.  Man  is  born  to 
live,  and  it  is  his  nature  to  view  all  phenomena  from  the 
standpoint  of  their  effect  on  himself.  What  helps  him  is 
good,  what  hinders  bad.  The  primitive  man  thought  that 
all  forces  were  animate.  And  every  force  had  its  character 
and  was  good  or  bad  according  as  it  affected  his  life  fav- 
orably or  destructively.  In  his  simple  thought  he  imagined 
living  conscious  spirits  behind  the  various  phenomena  of 
heat,  cold,  rain,  drouth,  hunger,  pain,  disease,  death,  and  a 
hundred  other  experiences.  Those  that  helped  him  were 
benevolent  and  the  others  were  malevolent. 

GOOD  AND  BAD  SPIRITS 

When  he  came  to  think  of  creation  he  ascribed  to  good 
spirits  the  good  things  and  to  bad  spirits  the  so-called  evil 
things, — as  many  spirits  as  there  were  things.  Finally  men 
came  to  think  themselves  surrounded  and  jealously  watched 
over  by  a  multitude  of  workers  for  weal  and  for  woe — the 
hosts  of  good  and  the  hosts  of  evil.  As  the  centuries  rolled 
on  they  reduced  these  powers  to  two;  one  infinitely  good, 
the  other  infinitely  bad.  This  was  a  great  step,  a  profound 
advance.  Steps  like  these  require  ages  of  experience  and 
thought.  With  a  wider  knowledge  of  Nature,  a  broader 
experience  and  keener  insight  man  is  now  taking  another 


214    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

step.  He  is  advancing  from  Dualism  to  Monism.  Gradually, 
as  this  progress  becomes  more  complete  he  is  seeing  that  the 
seeming  evil  is  largely  the  result  of  his  own  misunderstand- 
ing or  lack  of  understanding. 

EVIL  OF  TWO   KINDS 

In  their  analysis,  the  thinkers  of  the  ages  have  divided 
evils  into:  (i)  External  or  natural  evil;  and  (2)  Internal 
or  moral  evil.  Examples  of  the  first  are  found  in  cold, 
sunstroke,  earthquake,  cyclone,  etc.  Examples  of  the 
second  are  homicide,  theft,  slander,  deceit,  etc. 

HISTORICAL  EXPLANATION 

Where  did  evil  and  sin  originate?  The  history  of  the 
doctrine  of  these  great  themes  is  a  vast  one.  The  question 
of  the  origin  of  evil  has  baffled  philosophy  everywhere  in 
the  past.  Three  principal  theories,  single  and  commingled, 
have  been  discussed  for  some  three  thousand  years. 

(i)  God  made  everything,  therefore  He  made  the  evils; 
but  he  made  the  natural  evils  as  a  punishment  for  man's 
moral  evils.  In  Isaiah  XIV,  7,  we  read,  "I  form  the  light 
and  create  darkness ;  I  make  peace  and  create  evil.  I,  the 
Lord  (Yahweh),  do  all  these  things."  This  was  the  highest 
and  best  explanation  of  evil  the  Jewish  mind  had  reached 
in  the  sixth  century,  B.  C. 

(2)  The  Devil  made  the  evils.  God  could  not  have 
made  them  because  he  is  good.  God  permits  them  and  they 
thus  become  punishments  for  man's  sins.  This  theory  is 
of  Persian  origin.  It  was  borrowed  by  the  Jews  during 
their  captivity  and  had  become  widely  accepted  in  the  first 
century  of  our  era.  The  writer  of  the  Epistle  called  James 
says:  "Every  good  gift  and  every  perfect  gift  is  from  above, 
and  cometh  down  from  the  Father  of  lights  with  whom  is 
no  variableness,  neither  shadow  of  turning."     (I,  17.) 

(3)  The  "Fall  of  Man"  brought  about  all  the  evils. 
The  world  was  "Paradise"  before  then.     Moral  sin  caused 


THE  PROBLEM  OF  EVIL  215 

both  physical  and  moral  evil.  Earthquake  and  storm  are 
forms  of  divine  wrath  which  God  either  produces  or  permits 
as  punishment  or  consequence  of  sin.  Historical  investi- 
gators have  found  this  story  of  man's  fall  in  Assyrian  works 
of  much  more  ancient  date  than  the  Jewish  Genesis. 
Among  the  Jews  this  was  developed  as  a  sort  of  appendage 
to  the  first  two  views  after  their  return  from  Babylon.  In 
Saint  Paul's  time  it  was  a  formally  established  doctrine. 
"By  one  man  sin  entered  into  the  world  and  death  by  sin; 
and  so  death  passed  upon  all  men  for  that  all  have  sinned." 
(Rom.  V.  12.) 

These  are  the  principal  historic  explanations  of  this  great 
theme.  In  the  light  of  science  they  are  insufficient.  The 
old  theories  of  the  world  and  of  man  were  necessarily  based 
on  incomplete  data. 

LEGENDARY    POWERS   OF   EVIL 

In  the  history  of  religious  thought,  the  powers  of  nature 
which  man  did  not  understand  called  for  the  greater  share 
of  his  attention.  He  imagined  them  conscious  and  hostile. 
Hence  they  had  to  be  propitiated  or  outwitted.  They  re- 
quired his  constant  attention.  The  p)owers  for  good  need 
only  be  thanked.  This  explains  why  all  primitive  peoples 
devote  so  much  of  their  attention  to  reconciling  their  in- 
visible tormentors.  In  some  instances  the  evil  spirits 
monopolize  all  attention,  though  the  good  spirits  are  believed 
in.  RoskofT  (Gesch.  des  Teufels,  i,  47.)  tells  of  a 
Madaijascan  hymn  which  speaks  of  Zamhor  and  Niang  as 
creators  of  the  world,  and  further  states  that  Zamhor  has 
no  prayers  offered  to  him  because  he  is  the  good  god  and 
does  not  require  them.  Such  is  also  the  theological  opinion 
of  some  Hottentots  and  certain  Congo  Africans.  (Peschel, 
The  Races  of  Man,  2y().)  Other  similar  instances  have 
been  found  among  negroes  of  the  Slave  Coast,  Patagonians, 
Ahiponcs,  and  some  tribes  of  Guiana  in  South  America. 
The  worship  of  .Siva,  the  Destroyer,  in  India  is  a  striking 
example  of  attempted  conciliation  of  an  evil  god. 


2i6    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

As  in  man's  gods,  so  in  man,  the  kindlier  sentiments  are 
of  latest  origin.  Love  only  gradually  displaces  fear.  Hence 
the  appearance  of  grateful  emotions  toward  the  gods  is 
indicative  of  a  stage  of  comparatively  great  moral  advance- 
ment. No  longer  fear,  but  gratitude  brings  out  the  act. 
When  impulses  of  gratitude  and  love  of  acting  according 
to  the  conditions  of  life  shall  suggest  every  act  of  homage 
and  every  fulfilment  of  human  relations,  then  shall  be 
reached  the  stage  toward  which  the  best  individuals  of  the 
great  religions  have  striven.  Alas,  how  unevenly  the  course 
of  civilization  has  run.  Among  the  most  advanced  peoples, 
there  still  linger  those  with  the  primitive  point  of  view,  while 
beside  Christians  and  Buddhists  in  the  higher  order  of  moral 
development  may  be  set  some  of  the  Australians  of  New 
South  Wales,  (people  who  except  in  this,  are  in  the  very 
lowest  rank  of  civilization).  They  ignore  Potoyan  (their 
Devil),  and  offer  to  Koyan  (their  Good  Spirit)  all  their 
homage  and  sacrifices.  (Peschel,  280.)  The  old  Spanish 
priest  Gumilla,  positively  asserted  that  the  Indian  tribes  on 
the  Orinoco,  though  believing  in  a  bad  spirit,  give  him  no 
homage.  Such  instances  show  an  advanced  moral  stage  in 
the  midst  of  very  low  material  developments. 

THE   BEGINNING    OF    A    SOLUTION 

The  old  Assyrian  notion  of  original  perfection  and  moral 
lapse  of  the  progenitors  of  the  race  became  so  widespread 
and  took  so  deep  root  in  many  cases  that  a  solution  of  the 
problem  of  evil  was  rendered  as  difficult  as  it  could  be.  Any 
natural  study  of  the  facts  was  out  of  the  question.  Very 
gradually  after  the  Copernican  Astronomy  began  to  de- 
anthropomorphize  God  and  to  replace  the  Geocentric  by  the 
Heliocentric  conception  of  the  world  (the  Ptolemaic  by  the 
Copernican  system),  it  became  possible  to  think  of  man 
from  another  point  of  view.  With  the  re-explanation  of 
the  mode  of  world-creation  according  to  the  Kantian- 
Laplace  hypothesis  (nebular  theory),  and  of  the  earth's 
development  according  to  the  geological  theories  of  Hum- 


THE  PROBLEM  OF  EVIL  217 

boldt,  Lyell,  and  others,  there  came  the  possibility  of  a  new 
conception  of  human  career.  //  the  whole  solar  system  was 
the  result  of  an  evolution,  if  the  world  and  its  crust  and  its 
life  forms  were  products  of  gradual  development,  might  not 
the  Divine  Eternal  Energy  have  also  produced  man  by  the 
same  methods  which  it  employs  in  other  realms  of  the 
Universe  f 

And  thus  the  problem  was  opened  for  the  real  study  of 
sin  and  evil.  Science  in  this  century  has  learned  that  the 
earliest  men  were  the  least  perfect,  that  they  were,  as  we 
term  it,  the  least  developed,  the  least  civilized.  They  were 
at  the  bottom.  They  were  too  low  to  fall.  The  ideal 
Paradise  was  not  in  their  direction;  it  is  in  the  future.  Men 
are  evolving  toward  it.  The  first  men  did  not  reason. 
They  felt  very  little  if  any  sense  of  sin.  They  killed  and 
plundered  like  animals  with  little  notion  of  its  being  wrong. 
They  felt  no  higher  moral  sanctions,  and  therefore  violated 
no  higher  consciences.  They  were  not  evolved  to  perfection, 
and  therefore  left  no  hereditary  entailment  of  depravity. 
They  had  narrow  moral  feelings  toward  even  their  own 
kindred.  For  ages  they  had  no  moral  feeling  beyond  their 
own  tribe. 

STAGE  OF  MORAL  REASON 

Man,  like  the  rest  of  Nature,  is  an  evolved  product — not 
a  creation.  He  and  all  his  faculties  are  developments  from 
simpler  life  germs  and  forms.  Once  the  stage  of  reason  is 
reached,  comparisons  gradually  and  continually  follow. 
//  reason  led  a  man  to  make  a  better  club  or  spear,  it  would 
also  lead  him  to  make  a  better  idea  of  conduct  in  cases  here 
and  there.  As  soon  as  he  saw  the  better  possible  club  the 
old  one  became  bad.  As  soon  as  he  saw  the  better  possible 
act  the  former  practice  was  bad.  There  is  no  difference. 
The  new  in  all  cases  becomes  an  ideal.  As  such,  it  was  a 
command  not  to  do  the  other.  This  is  the  character  of  all 
early  commands.  Ix)ok  over  the  Decalogue,  the  Ten  Com- 
mandments in  Exodus  XX.  Observe  the  negative  character 
of  these;  and  yet  each  one  of  them  was  a  discovery,  and 


2i8     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

therefore  an  ideal.  The  discovery  of  the  new  and  the  better 
way  made  tlie  old  one  bad.  There  was  no  bad  until  the 
better  came.  The  good  was  good  by  comparison  with  what 
had  been.  This  is  the  nature  of  all  sin  and  all  evil.  Sin 
is  sin  because  it  is  not  up  to  the  ideal,  because  it  is  instigated 
by  promptings  developed  yesterday  instead  of  today. 

Nothing  is  good  or  bad  in  itself.  Goodness  and  badness 
come  in  the  contrasts  made  by  conscious  comprehension  of 
facts  and  conditions.  We  decide  this  to  be  good  and  that 
to  be  bad  by  its  eflfect  in  our  lives.  A  still  higher  good  or 
science  of  good  will  consider  its  effects  upon  all  lives.  It 
takes  the  use  of  the  moral  reason  to  make  the  decision. 
The  broader  the  moral  reason  the  broader  the  ideal.  Not 
until  the  better  is  seen  is  there  any  sin — that  is,  for  the  indi- 
vidual. If  he  has  tasted  the  "fruit  of  the  tree  of  knowledge" 
he  is  capable  of  sin.  And  so — not  more  and  not  less,  in 
any  stage  of  development.  Tasting  the  good  new-better 
makes  the  old-bad  bitter. 

It  turns  out  then  that  the  "Fall  of  Man"  was  a  rise.  It 
was  the  reaching  of  a  capacity  to  discern  higher  things. 
Our  Scriptural  account  and  the  various  oriental  stories  are 
poetical  statements  which  have  been  abused  by  literal  in- 
terpretations and  doctrinal  exaggerations.  Grand  indeed  is 
the  thought  expressed  in  Genesis,  "Ye  shall  be  as  gods, 
knowing  good  and  evil."  This,  more  than  any  other,  marks 
the  arrival  of  man  at  the  stage  of  the  so-called  "image  of 
God."  This  evolution  to  the  capacity  of  moral  reason  is 
doubtless  the  grandest  period  in  the  development  of  man, 
either  as  a  race  or  as  an  individual  merging  beyond  child- 
hood. The  moral  reason  takes  the  initiative.  It  is  forever 
comparing  and  forming  ideals.  It  is  year  by  year  getting 
more  clearly  before  the  mind  an  understanding  of  what  is 
and  an  insight  into  what  may  be.  It  is  making  the  suppos- 
edly hostile  forces  of  Nature  into  human  helpers.  And  in  a 
few  hearts  it  has  begotten  the  confident  hope  that  man  will 
yet  find  his  best  friends  and  a  Divine  Helper  in  all  these 
natural  powers  whose  action  only  struck  terror  into  the  men 
of  earlier  time. 


THE  PROBLEM  OF  EVIL  219 

From  Heaven  or  toward^  This  is  the  contrast.  It  is 
finely  stated  bv  Mary  F.  Butts  in  some  lines  "To  a  Water 
Lily." 

"O  star  on  the  breast  of  the  river, 

0  marvel  of  bloom  and  grace! 

Did  you  fall  straight  down  from  Heaven 

Out  of  the  Sweetest  Place? 
You  are  white  as  the  thought  of  an  angel. 

Your  heart  is  steeped  in  the  sun, 
Did  you  grow  in  the  Golden  City, 

My  pure  and  shining  one? 

"Nay,  nay,  I  'fell'  not  out  of  Heaven, 
None  'gave'  me  my  saintly  white; 

It  slowly  grew  from  the  blackness 
Down  in  the  dreary  night, 

From  the  ooze  of  the  silent  river 

1  won  my  glory  and  grace 
White  souls  'fall'  not,  O  my  poet, 

They  rise  to  the  Sweetest  Place." 

ORIGIN   OF  GOOD 

The  feeling  of  wrong  or  sin  has  poignantly  affected  life. 
Hence  the  many  theories  of  its  origin.  This  consciousness 
of  wrong  is  increased  with  intelligence.  The  more  man 
knows  the  more  consciousness  of  sin  is  possible.  There  is 
not  necessarily  more  sin,  but  there  is  more  thought  con- 
cerning moral  relations.  It  has  been  the  enigma  of  the  ages. 
Men  have  reasoned  over  this  problem  untiringly. 

Where  did  the  evil  and  sin  come  fromf  The  good  God 
could  not  and  would  not  have  made  thctn.  If  he  is  all- 
powerful  he  zvould  not  let  a  had  being  make  them.  Hence 
they  must  come  by  inheritance  from  wicked  ancestors. 

This  little  paragraph  tells  the  little  that  men  achieved  by 
thousands  of  years  of  traditional  adherence  and  half-hearted 
speculation. 

But  in  their  reasoning  the  men  of  the  past  have  made 
two  mistakes.  They  assioncd  perfection  behind  them,  and 
they  hunted  for  the  wrong  thing.  They  persistently  asked: 
How  did  sin  and  evil  enter  the  world? — while  they  all  the 


220    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

time  assumed  a  state  of  original  perfection.  We  now  see 
that  sin  and  evil  did  not  enter  the  world.  It  was  the  good 
that  came,  the  good  that  entered  the  world.  It  was  the 
ideal,  the  higher  conception  that  was  new.  Everything  was 
right  before,  i.  e.,  right  to  the  consciousness  of  the  individual. 
The  good  is  the  only  reality.  Evil  is  only  a  contrast  between 
goods.  Actions  become  evil  or  bad  only  if  better  ones  are 
realized  as  possible.  In  general,  selfishness  was  not  bad 
until  the  neighbor-regarding  feeling  became  conscious. 
Then  the  moral  reason  decided  against  selfishness  or  self- 
centeredness  as  the  narrower  view. 

We  see  that  the  problem  has  been  inverted.  It  is  the 
origin  of  good  that  men  should  have  been  seeking.  There 
was  no  evil  till  the  instinct  of  altruism  had  grown  and 
reason  had  made  the  former  practice  bad  by  showing  the 
better  way.  When  the  higher  is  seen  the  present  becomes 
bad.  Sin  consists  and  will  ever  consist  in  following  a  lower 
when  man  sees  a  higher  way.  Sin  is  not  the  violation  of  an 
external  command.  Sin  is  hindering  life  or  violating  the 
rights  or  chances  for  the  growth  of  life.  This  is  a  most 
tremendous  and  solemn  fact.  Man  is  accountable  to  his 
ideals.  To  each  one  these  ideals  are  "God's  will'  revealed 
through  reason.  They  may  not  be  clear,  they  may  be 
blurred  by  half  understanding;  yet  the  very  nature  of  things 
holds  us  responsible  for  effort  toward  their  attainment. 

Broadly  speaking,  good  means  obedience  to  the  ever- 
evolving  laws  of  the  Nature-God.  Bad  means  remaining  in 
what  was  and  is,  or  determining  to  so  remain.  The  past 
and  present  become  bad  when  the  better  future  is  seen. 
Toward  this  higher  future  away  from  the  lower  past,  we 
must  ever  strive.  The  highest  rest — perhaps  the  only  rest 
that  man  can  ever  know — is  longing  and  striving  toward  the 
Most  High.  The  aim  of  life,  the  satisfaction  of  life  is  the 
process  of  attaining  higher  life. 


IN  EMERSON'S  ELOQUENT  VERSE: 

"Eden  with  its  angels  bold. 
Love  and  flowers  and  coolest  sea, 
Is  not  ancient  story  told, 
But  a  glowing  prophecy. 
In  the  spirit's  perfect  air. 
In  the  passions  tame  and  kind. 
Innocent  from  selfish  care. 
The  real  Eden  we  shall  find. 
When  the  soul  to  sin  hath  died. 
True  and  beautiful  and  sound, 
Then  all  earth  is  sanctified, 
Upsprings  Paradise  around." 


221 


CHAPTER  XXI 
MORAL  SANCTIONS  FROM  BRUTE  TO  SAINT 

OLD   MOTIVES  TOO  LOW 

The  moral  sense  appears  in  the  world  below  the  stage  of 
man.  All  gregarious  animals  have  made  a  start  in  moral 
conduct.  In  rare  cases  this  has  reached  the  stage  of 
altruism,  an  actual  solicitude  for  the  welfare  of  others 
besides  mates  and  offspring.  A  blind  pelican  was  found  on 
the  banks  of  the  Great  Salt  Lake  being  fed  by  its  social 
comrades.     What  was  the  motive? 

In  our  age  there  is  greatly  increased  interest  in  this  topic. 
Many  former  motives  and  sanctions  are  now  being  tran- 
scended. We  have  a  newer  and  broader  point  of  view. 
This  not  only  requires  a  new  grounding  of  the  moral  life, 
new  explanations  and  new  arrangements  of  moral  facts; 
but  it  demands  that  men  act  from  higher  points  of  view. 
It  expects  that  they  have  higher  and  better  reasons  for  their 
conduct  than  their  forefathers  had.  It  insists  that  because 
more  knowledge  and  light  exist  in  this  age,  this  age  should 
live  on  a  higher  plane.  It  believes  that  the  facts  have  been 
discovered  which  form  the  basis  for  these  new  explanations 
and  bettered  life.  It  points  out  that  we  stand  at  the  later 
end  of  the  ages,  and  have,  therefore,  all  their  experiences, 
mistakes  and  discoveries  to  help  us  solve  what  they  did  not. 
l!:  accepts  not  only  the  task  of  getting  the  truth  and  solving 
the  problems  but  also  the  responsibility  of  leading  life  up 
to  this  higher  moral  idealism. 

Although  the  new  evolution  view  was  at  first  believed 
to  degrade  man,  it  is  now  seen  that  it  immeasurably  increases 
his  dignity.     All  old  views  implied,  more  or  less,  a  hopeless 

222 


MORAL  SANCTIONS  FROM  BRUTE  TO  SAINT  223 

depravity.  The  new  view  regards  every  fault  or  blemish 
as  outgrowable.  It  sets  no  limit  to  either  material  or  moral 
progress.  It  makes  life  when  it  is  high  one  continual  period 
of  hopefulness.  It  looks  forward  to  infinite  ages  of  human 
betterment.  It  sees  the  past  and  the  future  as  one  continu- 
ous up-trend.  It  furnishes  better  reasons  for  that  future 
and  is  making  better  conditions  in  the  present.  It  has  gone 
so  far  in  the  way  of  being  established  that  every  well- 
informed  person  is  today  as  much  of  an  evolutionist  as  he 
is  a  gravitationist. 

KINDS  OF   MORALITY 

Morality  may  be  classified  as  negative  and  positive. 

Negative  Morality  is  obedience  to  privative  or  hindering 
commands.  It  is  the  life  that  remains  within  prescribed 
limits.  The  negative  morality  of  former  times  does  not  do 
this  and  that.  It  was  careful  about  transgression.  It  was 
the  eflfort  to  avoid  penalties.  It  is  still  the  morality  of 
primitive  peoples  and  of  the  more  common  minds  the  world 
over.  Such  people  conceive  duty  to  be  done  when  certain 
forbidden  things  are  not  done.  They  have  been  good  when 
they  have  done  nothing  bad! 

Positive  Morality  lays  no  stress  on  not  doing.  The  "thou- 
shalt-nots"  are  irrelevant.  Where  these  are  motives,  there 
reigns  the  rule  of  force.  Brainless  life  in  nature  and  natures 
with  relatively  little  brains  follow  force  exclusively.  With 
higher  types  comes  the  dawn  of  higher  law.  It  begins  below 
man,  and  yet  many  men  have  comparatively  little  of  it. 
Real  man,  up-to-date  moral  man,  is  distinguished  by  con- 
scious effort  toward  its  realization.  In  many  ways  he 
attempts  to  substitute  affection  and  moral  reason  for  force. 
He  strives  not  only  to  exist  by  avoiding  the  consequences 
of  violation,  but  also  to  definitely  bring  himself  into  harmony 
with  law.  His  ancestors  in  early  times  developed  "deca- 
logues" of  things  not  to  do.  For  centuries  this  satisfied 
their  ideals.  By-and-by  arose  the  Christ-spirit.  According 
to  this,  mere  non-doing  is  not  human  living.     To  be  truly 


224    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

human,  men  must  do.  To  he  good,  men  must  he  good  for 
something.  Negative  morals  gradually  give  place  to  posi- 
tive. The  privative  commands  were  superseded  by  the 
beatitudes  of  love.  In  religion,  to  their  "Fatherhood  of 
God"  there  was  added  the  "Brotherhood  of  Man."  They 
believed  that  Nature  was  helpfulness  itself,  that  Nature  was 
all  giving.  Then  man  is  truly  a  child  of  Nature  only  when 
filled  with  the  spirit  of  helpfulness.  The  human  life  is 
achieved  by  eternally  living.  Moral  living  is  earnest,  for- 
ward living.  The  more  this  is  conscious,  the  more  is  the 
primitive  hated,  indeed,  as  we  have  seen,  the  advancing  good 
continually  creates  the  receding  bad.  There  neither  was  nor 
is  any  bad  until  the  hetter  is  conceived.  Sin  is  the  remainder 
or  residuum  of  the  proto-human  and  animal-human  life 
becoming  more  and  more  conscious.  Feeling  this,  man 
turns  toward  positive  well-doing.  Good-will  becomes  active 
good-will.  Good-will  that  is  not  active  is  not  even  Christian 
good-will.  It  is  not  will  or  character  at  all.  It  is  mere 
passivity  of  being.  Will  that  is  character  is  the  energy  of 
being  acting  in  the  direction  of  attention  that  is  conscious. 
In  its  lowest  stages  the  thing  we  here  allude  to  is  not  good 
will.  It  is  more  accurately  good-letting  alone;  harmless 
passivity.  We  see  the  good-will  crop  out  further  up  in  the 
scale  of  moral  sanctions. 


MORAL    SANCTIONS    DEFINED 

By  moral  sanction  I  understand  the  reason  for  doing 
right,  for  being  good,  for  considering  other  people  when  we 
undertake  anything.  For  all  conduct  there  is  some  external 
or  internal  circumstance  or  condition  which  operates  on  the 
human  mind  to  deter  from  certain  actions  or  to  incline  or 
impel  it  to  a  certain  opposite  line  of  action.  For  example,  if  a 
man  knows  that  if  he  beats  his  wife  he  will  have  to  be 
publicly  flogged  by  an  officer  of  the  law  acting  under  the 
approval  of  the  community,  and  if  he  refrains  from  wife- 
beating  because  of  the  officer's  lash  and  because  of  the  social 
disgrace,  these  become  moral  sanctions.     They  are  reasons 


MORAL  SANCTIONS  FROM  BRUTE  TO  SAINT  225 

for  his  behavior.  It  matters  not  whether  they  are  the 
highest  reasons.  They  are  his  reasons.  They  are  induce- 
ments toward  a  higher  Hne  of  conduct,  a  less  selfish  behavior 
than  he  would  otherwise  follow.  They  are  first  class  moral 
sanctions  for  his  grade  of  intelligence.  Perhaps  a  higher 
motive  might  not  be  operative  in  his  case. 

Now  if  we  look  over  society  in  difl^erent  regions  and  at 
different  times  in  the  past  we  discover  a  long  list  of  incen- 
tives toward  good  or  better  conduct.  Some  of  them  are 
what  we  would  call  very  low,  and  yet  they  have  been  useful. 
Some  of  them  we  should  call  high,  and  yet  they  are  not  as 
useful  as  we  could  wish.  Some  of  them  have  been  based 
on  threats  of  vengeance,  some  upon  promises  of  rewards, 
and  some  are  just  appeals  to  self-respect,  justice,  and  love. 
Some  of  these  threats  have  been  promised  in  the  present 
life  and  some  of  them  are  put  ofif  to  some  future  existence. 
And  so  with  the  promises  of  reward. 

Still  another  distinction  is  to  be  found  in  the  classes  of 
these  sanctions.  Some  of  them  are  called  political,  some 
ethical,  and  some  religions.  The  political  type  have  refer- 
ence to  individual  conduct  in  its  relation  to  the  state  or 
nati(jn.  The  ethical  refer  to  individual  behavior  in  the 
family  or  neighborhood.  And  the  religious  consider  life  in 
a  large  way  and  refer  to  one's  relations  of  allegiance  to  the 
gods  or  God.  Behind  all  three  .spheres  of  duty  stand  the 
general  motives  to  which  religions  have  appealed,  namely 
the  motives  of  the  conscfjuences  which  it  is  stated  the  gods 
will  impose  in  a  future  bfc.  Heaven  and  Hell  have  been 
invented  and  preached  as  definite  places  where  the  gods  will 
extend  rewards  or  inflict  punishment.  In  all  things  there 
is  progress — religion  and  morality  not  excepted.  Some 
moral  sanctions  are  new,  others  old.  The  newest  should  be 
the  highest,  and  in  most  cases  they  probably  are. 

These  moral  sanctions  have  their  roots  in  instinctive 
promf)tings  resulting  in  fear,  hope,  and  love.  Observe  the 
(jrder.  The  first  is  lowest;  the  last,  highest.  The  lowest 
sanctions  make  man  strive  to  avoid  something;  the  next 
group  make  him  strive  to  obtain  something;  .uid  the  highest 


226    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR   CIVILIZATION 

make  him  strive  to  give  something.     These  series  of  moral 
sanctions  belong  to  different  grades  of  intelligence. 

The  ignorant  fear; 

The  would-be-shrewd  expect  or  desire; 

The  truly  wise  yield  themselves  wholly  to  the  Law,  the  Life, 
and  Love  Universal. 


MORAL  SANCTIONS  FROM  BRUTE  TO  SAINT  227 

CLASSIFIED  LIST  OF  MORAL  SANCTIONS 

The  Evolutionary  Order 

GROUP  I.     FEARS— AVOIDANCE;   ESCAPING— 

1.  Of  injury — by  fist,   club,   lash,   dagger,   revolver,  or  natural 

forces. 

2.  Of  custody — in  stocks,  pillory,  ball  and  chain,  jail,  or  peniten- 

tiary. 

3.  Of   death — by   knife,    sword,    ax,    gallows,    stake,    guillotine, 

bullet,  or  electric  chair. 

4.  Of  future  life  torture — days  of  Judgment,  Purgatory,  Hells. 

(Hot  are  of  Persian  origin;   cold,  of  Scandinavian) 

GROUP  II.     HOPES— GETTING;   EXPECTATIONS— 

1.  Of  sexual  favoritism — approval  of  the  opposite  sex — chivalry, 

gallantry,  foppery,  dudism,  prinking. 

2.  Of  material  rewards — in  bribes,  wages,  co-operative  advan- 

tages;  divine  favors. 

3.  Of  social  rewards — by  public  approval,  office,   fame,   social 

invitations,  vanity-fair  prizes. 

4.  Of  future  life  joys — through  approval  of  manlike  gods,  deities, 

giving  heaven,  happy  hunting  grounds,  elegant  mansions, 
golden  streets,  perpetual  music,  crowds,  no  work. 

GROUP  III.     LOVES— GIVING  RESPECT— 

1.  In  family  feeling — maternal,  paternal,  fraternal,  regard  for 

kindred. 

2.  Tribal  or  national  feeling — regard  for  the  gens,  citizenship, 

legislation,  law  and  order  leagues,  good  government  clubs, 
anti-vice  societies,  etc. 

3.  In  humanity  feeling — interest  In  history,  progressive  evolu- 

tion of  mankind  by  natural  social  laws. 

4.  In  vicarious  sympathy — Joining  in  the  sacrificing  labors  and 

trials  of  the  good. 

5.  In  sense  of  Justice  and  equity—  responsiveness  to  Impersonal 

right,  conscious  effort  of  the  Individual  will. 

6.  In  love  of  the  true,  the  good,  and  the  beautiful— culminating 

In  earnestness  toward  all  that  is  natural,  1.  e.,  to  all  that 
Is  potentially  Innate  In  the  physical  and  psychical  realms. 
("The  true  Is  what  is;  the  good  Is  what  ought  to  be;  the 
beautiful  Is  what  1b  as  it  ought  to  be.") 


228    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 


SIZING  UP  LIVES 

This  table  is  a  moral  yard  stick.  By  it  lives  can  be  sized 
up.  It  tells  motives  for  the  highest  and  lowest  human  acts. 
These  motives  all  co-exist  yet  in  the  highest  civilization. 
Each  of  the  lower  types  still  survives  here  and  there  in  the 
lower  grades  of  society.  Each  of  them  is  found  contem- 
porary with,  or  belonging  to  certain  stages  of  intelligence. 
The  horse  and  the  ass  must  have  the  bit,  the  spur,  or  the 
whip.  The  lion  is  humbled  by  the  lash  and  the  club;  and 
so  in  proportion  as  there  is  little  sense,  little  conscious 
comprehension,  and  strong  instinctive  impulse.  Fear  re- 
strains, but  does  not  develop.  It  is  negative  and  not  positive. 
It  is  not  a  motive  to  good  conduct ;  it  is  a  motive  from 
certain  self-impelled  but  socially  undesirable  types  of  con- 
duct. It  is  a  misconception  to  think  that  the  world  has 
made  or  makes  its  best  or  its  human  progress  on  the  "Thou- 
shalt-nots."  They  are  simply  socially  protective.  The 
progress  now  is  accomplished  by  the  few  who  have  got 
beyond  these  motives.  The  conversion  that  had  only  fear 
at  the  bottom  is  not  a  character  conversion  at  all.  By-and- 
by  it  may  become  a  habit.  But  such  natures  are  not  changed 
in  a  brief  time  to  mercy,  justice,  purity,  and  moral  beauty. 
Hence  fear  is  only  in  a  very  distant  way  a  motive  to  pro- 
gressive morals.  Such  conduct  is  not  moral  in  any  civilized 
sense.  Qiristian  morality  is  positive.  It  is  not  the  Deca- 
logue but  the  Beatitudes. 

In  our  day  the  great  majority  have  reached  the  stage 
which  makes  possible  the  use  of  some  higher  motives  and 
sanctions.  The  Middle  Age  threats  and  promises  of  Hell 
and  Heaven  are  now  very  little  useful  as  moral  appeals.  As 
the  warmth  and  light  and  moisture  break  the  hard  seed  and 
make  it  sprout  and  grow  and  ultimately  blossom  and  bring 
forth,  so  it  is  the  highest  group  of  incentives  that  are  more 
influential.  Particularly  we  should  suspect  and  make  little 
use  of  the  lowest  group.  If  heat  and  light  and  moisture 
will  not  open  the  life  expanding  tendencies  of  the  seed,  it 
probably  will  not  grow.     It  is  hard  to  believe  in  the  higher 


MORAL  SANCTIONS  FROM  BRUTE  TO  SAINT  229 

moral  incapacity  of  any  human  being,  and  yet  anthropolo- 
gists have  shown  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  inability  to 
grasp  certain  important  moral  truths  as  well  as  intellectual 
ones.  But  if  they  are  to  be  reached  at  all,  reached  for 
character,  it  must  be  by  alluring,  enticing,  drawing  out. 
To  use  a  paradoxical  expression,  they  may  be  color-blind 
morally,  but  if  so  we  shall  not  make  them  see  morally  by 
driving  them  to  this  or  that  action.  The  motive  that  builds 
character  is  from  before,  not  from  behind.  Someone  has 
well  said :  "Fear  is  only  the  hangman  of  the  Divine  Govern- 
ment." But  hanging  a  man  does  not  reform  him.  A 
hangman  is  not  a  reformer.  He  only  forever  restrains  the 
man  he  hangs.  So  we  can  only  make  man  better  by  making 
the  view  of  the  higher  life  clearer,  by  picturing  the  loveliness 
and  beauty  and  glory  of  the  higher  law  as  seen  in  human 
hearts.  \\'e  must  present  the  innate  facts  and  laws  of 
nature  and  life  not  in  the  old  way  of  redeeming  man  from 
some  god's  unforeseen  wrath,  but  in  the  intelligent  light  of 
explained  conditions.  Information  alone  produces  reforma- 
tion 

Our  age  is  re-defining  God  and  Law.  The  revelations 
of  demonstrated  science  picture  something  vastly  different 
from  yesterday's  notions.  As  fast  as  men  come  to  realize 
this  they  take  on  a  helpful,  universal,  caretaking  nature; 
they  enter  upon  an  upward  life.  They  will  see  that  there 
is  no  outside  law-giver,  but  that  an  ever-upward,  ever- 
onward  progress  is  the  nature  of  life.  They  will  see  them- 
selves as  living  in  and  thrcjugh  that  nature,  and  safe  only 
when  their  lives  blend  in  harmony  with  its  latest  activities. 
In  harmony  with  that  nature,  they  will  realize  in  themselves 
an  ever  transcending  goodness,  a  gf)f)(lness  that  does  not 
clear  the  guilty,  a  goodness  that  never  pardons,  a  goodness, 
however,  that  always  makes  new  possibilities,  a  goodness 
which  once  known  is  longed  for.  "And  such  a  love  casteth 
out  fear." 

One  of  the  best  expressions  of  the  later  orthodox  view 
of  God's  pnrt  anrl  man's  in  this  .sorry  matter  of  man's 
thought  about  their  relations,  is  founH  in  a  poem  of  thirteen 


230    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR   CIVILIZATION 

stanzas  by  Rev.  Frederic  W.  Faber,  D.  D.  Parts  of  it  have 
been  widely  used  as  a  hymn,  and  it  has  met  with  unusual 
favor  in  various  denominations  wherever  English  is  spoken. 
No  sweeter  statement  was  ever  penned.  But  its  art  cannot 
make  it  live.  This  conception  of  God  and  man  is  not  longer 
holding  in  the  minds  of  those  who  are  looking  up  the  facts 
of  the  Universe. 

There's  a  wideness  in  God's  mercy, 

Like  the  wideness  of  the  sea; 
There's  a  kindness  in  his  justice. 

Which  is  more  than  liberty. 
There's  a  welcome  for  the  sinner 

And  more  graces  for  the  good; 
There  is  mercy  with  the  Savior, 

There  is  healing  in  his  blood. 

There  is  no  place  where  earth's  sorrows 

Are  more  felt  than  up  in  Heaven; 
There  is  no  place  where  earth's  failings 

Have  such  kindly  judgment  given. 
There  is  plentiful  redemption 

In  the  blood  that  has  been  shed; 
There  is  joy  for  all  the  members 

In  the  sorrows  of  the  Head. 

For  the  love  of  God  is  broader 

Than  the  measure  of  man's  mind, 
And  the  heart  of  the  Eternal 

Is  most  wonderfully  kind. 
If  our  love  were  but  more  simple, 
'  We  should  take  him  at  his  word; 

And  our  lives  would  be  all  sunshine 
r-  In  the  sweetness  of  our  Lord. 


The  following  paraphrase  of  The  Faber  Hymn  is  sug- 
gested as  expressing  today's  longing  on  the  basis  of  today's 
facts : 

THE  NEW  REDEMPTION 

There's  a  wideness  in  Life's  outlook, 

Like  the  wideness  of  the  sea; 

There's  a  kindness  sometime  coming, 
Hand  in  hand  with  liberty. 

There'll  be  chances  for  the  erring. 

Still  more  graces  for  the  good; 
For  there's  always  room  for  rising 

Into  higher  humanhood. 

There  is  plentiful  redemption 

Into  nobler  better  life; 
There'll  be  ways  found  for  avoiding 

Human  troubles,  earthly  strife; 
For  man's  love  will  yet  be  broader 

Than  the  measure  of  his  mind; 
In  the  heart  will  be  included 

Every  form  of  humankind. 

Clinging  to  the  old-time  notions — 

"Fall  of  Man"  and  "Vale  of  Tears," 
Missed  we  thus  the  Heaven  around  us 

In  the  Hell  of  groundless  fears. 
When  our  love  has  reached  that  broadness 

It  will  banish  every  awe; 
And  our  lives  will  be  all  gladness 

In  our  loyalty  to  Law. 

DUREN  J.  H.  WARD 


231 


CHAPTER  XXII 

PRAYER  AND  LAW  AND  COMMON  SENSE 

So  long  as  man  believes  in  gods  of  his  own  make,  so  long 
will  he  keep  trying  to  make  them  do  the  odds  and  ends 
that  he  shirks.  He  will  lead  only  a  half-hearted  life  while 
he  thinks  his  god  will  look  out  for  him  when  life  reaches 
a  pinch.  For  the  most  part  mankind  are  kids  shirking  their 
duties  and  trying  to  get  out  of  the  punishments  they  know 
are  coming.  One  little  boy  had  been  repeatedly  told  to  do 
a  certain  thing  and  just  as  often  neglected  it.  On  the  way 
to  the  dark  closet  in  the  strong  grasp  of  his  father,  he 
shrieked,  "O  Lord,  if  you  want  to  help  a  little  boy,  now's 
vour  chance !" 

^  

There  are  various  "reformations."  The  one  on  prayer  is 
yet  to  be.  And  after  any  reformation  has  started,  ages 
have  to  pass  before  all  men  embody  it.  For  50,000  or  more 
years  the  one  idea,  that  "prayer  is  petition"  and  that  the 
gods  will  hear  it  and  answer  it,  if  it  is  done  in  accord  with 
their  way — this  one  idea  has  prevailed. 

And  yet  the  infinitely  astonishing  fact  is  that  the  gods, 
nor  any  God,  never  answered  any  prayer  in  all  human 
history !  Infinite  Power  working  by  Infinite  Law  over  Infi- 
nite Realms  has  prevailed  through  Infinite  Time.  There 
neither  is,  nor  was,  nor  can  be  any  room  for  special  change 
from  inherent  and  immutable  causal  relations.  (This  I 
shall  not  here  argue  further  than  to  cite  the  whole  body  of 
Modern  Science.  He  who  does  not  now  believe  it  will 
change  his  mind  after  he  has  read  a  text-book  or  taken  a 
course  each  in  Astronomy,  Geology,  Biology,  Physics,  Chem- 
istry, Psychology,  and  Sociology.) 

232 


PRAYER  AND  LAW  AND  COMMON  SENSE    233 

The  belief  in  prayer  has  become  a  habit  of  the  race. 
Moreover,  it  is  a  bad  habit  which  men  expect  of  each  other. 
As  Rev.  Geo.  Batchelor  says,  "Men  pray  because  they  dare 
not  cease  to  pray.  They  pray  as  a  duty  that  is  required  of 
them,  an  observance  that  they  are  afraid  to  omit."  If  more 
people  only  dared  to  tell  the  truth,  they  would  say,  "You 
are  right  Mr.  Batchelor."  Yet  thousands  and  tens  of  thou- 
sands are  praying  who  do  not  expect  to  get  a  thing  they  ask 
for,  while  millions  are  not  praying  at  all. 

PRAYERLESS  ARE  EQUALLY  RELIGIOUS 

Now  there  must  be  some  reasons,  some  sound  reasons  for 
this.  They  who  do  not  pray  are  not  "Atheists,"  "Infidels," 
"Immoral."  It  is  too  late  in  the  history  of  the  world  to 
call  names  and  charge  their  lack  of  faith  to  these.  There 
are  today  more  people  who  are  instigated  by  a  sense  of  duty 
than  ever  before  in  the  history  of  the  world.  If  many  of 
them  do  not  want  to  pray,  it  is  not  that  they  want  to  get  rid 
of  one  of  their  duties.  It  is  because  they  have  come  to 
understand  the  universe  in  a  new  way.  They  have  experi- 
enced a  prnfnund  change  of  opinion  regarding  God,  His 
nature  and  His  mode  of  work.  And  these  new  opinions 
are  modified  by  or  based  on  the  demonstrations  of  science. 
If  the  universe  was  not  operated  with  some  regularity  it 
would  not  be  the  subject  of  reason.  Science  can  only  pro- 
ceed in  realms  where  causal  relations  hold  with  nearly 
absolute  certainty.  But  Science  has  built  up  an  enormous 
body  of  knowledge,  and  hence  every  successful  step  it 
takes  is  but  another  proof  of  the  irrefutability  of  its  founda- 
tion principle.  I'"oIlovving  its  lead,  the  general  transf(;rma- 
tion  of  conception  from  the  transcendent,  superatural,  and 
more  or  less  mechanically  operative  God  to  lh;it  of  an 
Immanent,  All-pervading,  Natural,  and  Immutable  lOncrgy, 
has  wrought  an  Cfjually  extensive  change  in  (he  conception 
of  our  relations  to  the  Heart  of  Things. 


234    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

THE  NEW  UNIVERSE 

In  154s  Copernicus  published  a  discovery  that  utterly 
changed  man's  notion  of  the  universe,  and  it  utterly  changed 
the  notion  of  God  for  all  those  who  have  used  their  brains 
enough  to  know  the  meaning  of  the  discovery.  The  diflfer- 
ence  is  too  great  for  one  thought  or  for  one  sentence. 
Before,  there  was  a  little  flat,  plain  earth  covered  by  a  solid 
blue  dome,  above  which  was  the  City  of  God,  and  the  earth 
itself  was  the  great  work  of  the  manlike  wonder-working 
God  who  made  a  man  "in  His  own  image."  After  Coperni- 
cus there  was  a  round  earth,  an  insignificant  orb  in  a  mighty 
system,  and  this  system,  one  among  millions  of  similar  ones, 
these  all  soaring  at  inconceivable  velocities  through  illimit- 
able space,  and  in  and  through  and  amidst  the  infinitude  of 
burning  suns  and  shining  worlds,  there  was  the  All-pervad- 
ing, Eternal  Spirit,  the  Energy  and  the  Essence  of  it,  the 
"God"  whom  man  had  in  all  the  ages  seen  and  felt,  and  yet 
had  not  known.  Heaven  and  Hell  as  antitheses  were  forever 
destroyed.  All  was  Heaven.  God  was  no  more  up  in 
Heaven  than  he  was  down  in  Heaven.  He  was  no  more 
there  than  here.  Only  by  the  most  childish  boasting 
assumption  could  we  speak  of  being  "made  in  His  own 
image."  He  cannot  be  "imaged"  at  all,  and  we  are  not 
"made"  at  all.  Before  the  thought  of  him  we  can  hut  place 
our  hands  upon  our  mouths  and  hold  our  breath.  And 
shall  not  this  vast  change  in  the  idea  of  the  world  and  of  the 
nature  of  God  change  our  idea  of  the  mode  of  our  approach 
to  Him? 

All  the  prayer  of  the  past — and  most  of  the  prayer  of  the 
present — is  m,an-c entered  instead  of  God-centered,  egoistic 
instead  of  theistic.  This  is  the  reverse  of  both  the  physical 
and  the  moral  facts.  The  physical  fact  is  and  always  has 
been,  that  God  was  unchangeable  and  that  if  man  was  to 
enjoy  His  blessing  man  must  do,  and  not  God.  The  moral 
fact  is  and  always  has  been,  that  man  became  better  not  by 
God's  hearing  but  by  man's  doing.  Man  has  unceasingly 
called  on  God  to  come  down  to  him  or  to  listen  to  him. 


PRAYER  AND  LAW  AND  COMMON  SENSE    235 

Nearly  all  the  known  forms  of  prayer  show  this.  "God 
bless  us  !"  "God  have  mercy  upon  us  !"  "God  grant  this !" 
"O  God !  wilt  thou  hear,  and  do  this  and  that !"  What  are 
all  these  beseechments  for?  Do  they  not  show  that  men 
expect  that  by  so  praying  they  will  get  God  to  do  something 
that  he  will  not  do  unless  they  entreat  and  remind  him? 

FINDING  OUT  LAW 

But  all  intelligent  people  now  know  that  the  Conditions 
or  Laws  of  God  (or  Nature)  are  not  subject  to  our  wish, 
that  they  are  impartial,  and  that  effects  only  come  when 
their  natural  causes  have  preceded  them.  Man  did  not 
know  this  (except  here  and  there  an  individual)  until  recent 
times.  Now  that  he  does  know  this  great  fact,  has  he  not 
reversed  his  former  idea  of  prayer?  Can  he  not  now  see 
that  God  does  not  (and  never  did)  bring  the  blessings  to 
him,  but  the  blessings  are  now  (and  always  were)  obtained 
by  man's  going  where  they  were?  Man  knows  that  all  bless- 
ings are  within  the  gate  of  natural  law,  and  that  the  getting 
of  them  is  only  accomplished  by  the  learning  and  the  living 
of  that  law.  Asking  for  them,  praying,  has  nothing  what- 
ever to  do  with  the  getting  of  them.  Praying  is  no  more 
effective  in  getting  things  we  want  or  ought  to  have,  than 
the  sailor's  whistling  would  be  in  getting  a  ship  across  the 
ocean.  Not  those  who  whistle,  liut  those  who  set  the  sails 
and  handle  the  rudder  reach  the  port  they  wish.  So  in 
every  realm,  not  those  who  lift  their  hands  and  voices  in 
prayer  are  blessed,  but  those  who  learn  the  law  and  comply 
with  it. 

And  who  will  undertake  to  say  that  this  is  not  true  in 
"Spiritual"  things  as  well  ?  Can  the  most  ardent  of  those 
who  "wait  in  prayer"  teach  Emerson  aught  concerning  the 
things  of  the  soul  or  of  God?  Would  any  of  them  presume 
to  call  him  poor  in  "spiritual  and  divine  things?"  And 
would  he  have  had  more  by  asking?  Nay,  did  he  not  make 
his  greatest  "spiritual  attainments"  after  he  left  off  the 
ceremony  of  prayerful  address?     Do  we  not  kn(jw  that  it  is 


236    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

just  because  of  his  i2:reat  spiritual  insight  that  men  cite  him? 
Why  then,  have  they  not  thought  before  to  learn  from  him 
how  to  get  that  on  which  they  lay  so  great  store?  It  is 
hard  now  to  find  any  one  who  does  not  believe  that  good 
comes  from  learning,  doing,  and  being.  If  so,  why  do  they 
go  through  the  mockery  of  asking  God  to  give  it  to  them? 
Do  they  not  have  the  intelligence  also  to  see  that  petitioning 
prayer  is  Ji'uidcring  ceremony?  that  they  are  cheating  them- 
selves by  keeping  their  attention  off  from  the  real  way  to 
the  blessing  they  need? 

This  petitioning  prayer  was  the  best  possible  in  the  days 
when  men  really  thought  that  God  came  to  those  who  asked. 
They  did  not  have  mind  enough  to  distinguish  between 
incidental  and  causal  connections.  But  it  is  different  now. 
Modern  investigations  have  given  us  a  deeper  insight,  and 
it  is  a  new  revelation.  This  makes  us  see  the  Eternal  Con- 
dition of  life  and  being,  and  that  whenever  there  is  an 
honest  soul  with  average  sense,  there  is  also  there  the 
Eternal  Condition  (God),  which  means  the  opportunity  for 
discernment,  for  doing,  and  for  reaping  the  good  that  follows 
as  consequence.  And  this  would  come  alike  to  "heathen"  or 
"Christian,"  simply  because  law  was  seen  and  obeyed, 
nature  was  lived  up  to,  life  was  put  into  harmony  with  its 
highest  conditions. 

NO  PETITION 

This  all  leads  to  the  startling  and  solemn  fact,  that  if 
prayer  is  to  be  retained  in  any  sense  whatever,  it  must  be  in 
a  higher  one  than  that  which  is  commonly  practiced. 
Petition  is  worse  than  useless.  It  is  a  farce.  There  should 
never  be  a  breath  of  it. 

Now,  can  there  be,  or  is  there  any  other  way?  Of  course, 
all  prayer  had  its  origin  in  a  feeling  of  need  and  of  imperfect 
life.  The  old  way  in  primitive  minds  was  to  call  on  God 
for  help.  This  he  never  did  for  or  because  of  the  asking. 
By  the  experience  of  our  ancestors,  by  the  results  of  our 
studies   in   Science,   by   our   own   experience   and   rational 


PRAYER  AND  LAW  AND  COMMON  SENSE    237 

powers,  God  the  Eternal  Condition,  (the  inimitable  Energy) 
has  shown  us  how,  is  showing  us  how,  and  ever  and  only 
thus  will  show  us  how  to  live.  We  must  get  up  and  help 
ourselves,  or  sit  still  and  gradually  die.  God  is  immovable 
till  we  move.  Or,  better  say,  God  is  always  acting,  higher 
life  is  always  possible,  but  we  are  so  nearly  always  not 
moving,  and  so  unceasingly  deluding  ourselves  into  the 
belief,  that  if  we  ask  we  shall  receive,  that  the  good  we 
yearn  most  for  we  never  get. 

EXPRESSING  AWE  AND  ASPIRATION 

The  prayer  that  is  helpful  then  must  not  violate  our 
"common  sense"  or  our  reason.  If  it  is  to  help  the  soul, 
it  must  be  the  soul  trying  to  tell  the  truth. 

Part  of  the  truth  is  the  expression  of  its  sense  of  depend- 
ence. 

Another  part  is  its  feeling  of  awe  and  adoration  at  the 
grandeur  and  infinitude  of  God  and  His  manifestations. 

Still  others  are  the  lofty  appreciation  of  the  pozvers  and 
beauties  and  ever  higher  adaptations  seen  in  all  life  and 
nature. 

And  lastly,  the  expression  of  keen  antl  profound  yearning 
and  aspiration  for  higher  and  better  states  felt  by  every  soul 
that  jxjssesses  both  a  reasonably  familiar  understanding  with 
the  "new  universe"  and  a  genuine  effort  to  fall  in  with  the 
upward  trends  of  the  Spirit  P(nver  that  is  in  and  tlirijugh 
it  all. 

If  such  words  and  thoughts  form  our  prayers  they  are 
more  or  less  consistent,  and  they  may  be  subjectively  heljiful 
in  all  things,  both  spiritual  and  material.  If  our  prayers 
are  marred  with  the  incongruities  of  intermingled  petition, 
then  they  are  inverting  the  process  of  life.  We  are  asking 
from  (]()(]  what  we  must  get  for  ourselves  under  the  condi- 
tions laid  down  in  the  very  nature  of  our  existence. 

By  the  survival  of  the  ingrained  bad  habit  of  jietition,  we 
are  blind  to  its  incompatibihty  witli  our  other  beliefs.  Our 
prayers  and  our  geography  do  not  agree.     We  are  making 


238    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

a  farce  of  our  lives,  and  do  not  realize  it.  We  are  so  bound 
to  a  theory  "for  righteousness'  sake,"  that  we  commit  the 
highest  (or  lowest)  act  of  unrighteousness  in  adhering  to 
it  after  it  is  outgrown,  or  in  making  the  absurd  assertion 
that  it  is  not  improvable.  //  would  be  vastly  better  if  we 
could  drop  the  term  "prayer"  and  agree  upon  a  term  which 
expressed  the  true  and  uplifting  idea  alone.  It  is  a  calamity 
to  have  so  noble  a  feature  of  life  as  our  higher  yearnings  go 
handicapped  by  a  name  historically  effete. 

Whatever  we  call  the  act,  our  purpose  is  to  uplift  the 
sold  to  the  Highest,  and  7wt  to  down-pull  God  to  the  soul. 
Our  prayer  is  not  enlightened  if  we  attempt  in  it  more  than 
the  expressions  of  our  deepest  meditations  concerning  na- 
ture and  life  and  our  aspirations  concerning  their  relations.* 


♦  My  earlier  ministerial  practice  followed  the  standard  bad 
habit  of  unprepared  petitioning  prayer.  During  the  first  eight 
years  of  attempted  liberal  preaching,  the  prayer  took  on  the  form 
of  an  apostrophe  to  the  Infinite  along  the  lines  Just  stated. 
In  the  last  five  years  of  my  preaching,  the  serious  and  religious 
impressions  and  feelings  grew  stronger.  I  ceased  to  lecture  the 
audience  indirectly  by  familiar  address  to  the  Interstellar 
Energy,  and  used  the  prayer  time  for  some  specially  interesting 
or  profound  fact  of  Science  bearing  on  life.  This  required  much 
study,  but  it  interested  the  people,  produced  greatly  increased 
seriousness,  and  left  lasting  impressions.  The  hundreds  of 
warm  and  appreciative  congratulations  that  followed  were  a 
constant  surprise  as  well  as  satisfaction. 


"O  Thou  that  art!  Ecclesiastes  calls  Thee  Omnipotent;  the 
Maccabees  call  Thee  Creator;  the  Epistle  to  the  Ephesians  calls 
Thee  Liberty;  Baruch  calls  Thee  Immensity;  the  Psalms  call 
Thee  Wisdom  and  Truth;  St.  John  calls  Thee  Light;  the  Book 
of  Kings  calls  Thee  Lord;  Exodus  calls  Thee  Providence;  Leviti- 
cus, Holiness;  Esdras,  Justice;  Creation  calls  Thee  God;  man 
calls  Thee  Father;  but  Solomon  calls  Thee  Mercy." 

VICTOR  HUGO 


239 


CHAPTER  XXIII 
THE  OLD  WORSHIP  AND  THE  NEW 

"worship  is  admiration," — WORDSWORTH 

To  realize  the  element  common  to  all  worship  is  to  de- 
termine the  unalloyed  nature  of  worship.  Worship  (always 
and  everywhere,  whatever  else  it  is  and  by  whatever  for- 
malities it  is  carried  out)  is  the  more  or  less  conscious 
etifort  of  the  mind  to  put  itself  into  earnest  and  ideal  activity. 

Religion  is  lofty  seriousness  of  purpose.  It  is  the 
dwelling  of  the  mind  in  a  state  of  high  earnestness  of  yearn- 
ing. Formerly,  and  still  very  largely,  this  was  accomplished 
by  oft-repeated  forms  and  ceremonies  brought  down  from 
former  times.  Today,  among  those  who  are  getting  free 
from  the  trammels  of  tradition,  Religion  is  life  pushing  out 
toward  the  higher  unattained,  in  truth  or  conduct.  //  is 
the  soul's  eternal  reach  for  that  which  is  just  beyond  its 
grasp.  It  is  that  noble  earnestness  found  in  all  times  and 
climes. 

This  is  the  heart  of  all  the  religions.  There  is  something 
to  get  away  from.  There  is  something  to  get  forward  to. 
But  this  again  is  simply  good  living,  the  effort  for  "The 
Better  Life."  When  labeled  and  dressed  up  with  dogmas 
and  cults,  it  becomes  some  form  of  historical  religion.  For 
these,  men  have  gone  through  fears  and  agonies,  performed 
sacrifices  and  penances,  wailed  incantations  and  prayers. 
And  yet,  for  lack  of  understanding,  they  have  made  only 
limited  advances  in  higher  life  and  character. 

HOW  THE  OLD  RELIGIONS  ANSWER 

Religion  as  theory  and  dogma  is  an  explanation  of  the 
world — a  Cosmology.     As  dogma  it  requires  loyalty  to  this 

240 


THE  OLD  WORSHIP  AND  THE  NEW        241 

supposedly  great  truth.  Hence,  each  great  historical  reli- 
gion has  both,  i.  e.,  some  large  explanation  of  God,  man 
and  the  world;  besides  some  relatively  grand  central  ideal 
of  life.  Each  finds  exercise  for  some  special  feature  or 
activity  of  the  human  mind.  Each  has  a  special  and  limited 
psychology.  Each  lays  stress  on  some  evil  in  human  life. 
Each  presents  a  way  of  escape  from  that  evil.  That  way 
of  escape  is  the  way  of  "Salvation" — in  that  particular  re- 
ligion. Some  idea  of  salvation  is  central  to  all  religion. 
The  stress  is  laid  or  the  emphasis  is  given  upon  the  relief 
from  some  great  evil  to  some  great  good.  Each  approaches 
it  in  a  different  way. 

Notice  here  that  we  are  dealing  with  these  great  religions 
as  historical  movements.  We  are  not  thinking  of  them  in 
the  special  sense  in  which  we  may  have  been  brought  up, 
but  rather  in  their  larger  meaning  as  shown  by  their  history 
as  world-movements.  We  might  in  the  same  manner  con- 
sider all  lesser  religions. 

THE  PSYCHOLOGY  OF  THE  GREAT  RELIGIONS* 

BRAHMINISM 

Evil  or  error  to  be  saved  from;  Ignorance. 
Cause ;  Illusion,  illusory  character  of  whole  material  world. 
Means  of  salvation;  Right  knowledge  (spiritual  monism). 
Characteristics    of    Brahminism;    Intellectual,    reflective, 
philosophical. 

BUDDHISM 

Evil ;  Sorrow,  trouble,  pain. 

Cause;  Desire;  yearning  to  live  in  this  illusory  existence. 
Means;    .Suppression    of   desire,    nihilism,    nttainment    of 
Nirvana.     Spirit  and  matter,  joy  and  pain  ahke  unreal. 

•  Prof.  C.  C.  Everett  of  Ilarvaid  Divinity  Rcliool  was  wont  to 
analyze  the  historical  religionH  on  the  basis  of  some  p.sycho- 
logical  faculty  emphasized  by  each.  I  have  followed  thi.s  sug- 
gestion out  with  more  detail. 


242    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

Characteristics  of  Buddhism;  Sympathetic — fellow  feel- 
ing. 

PERSIANISM  OR  ZOROASTRIANISM 

Evil;  Impurity  or  uncleanness — essentially  bad  material 
world. 

Cause;  Birth,  life  in  Ahriman's  realm,  material  existence 
— with  the  Power  of  Darkness. 

Means;  Spiritual  rebirth,  death,  purification,  siding  with 
Ormuzd,  the  Power  of  Light,  realizing  dualism. 

Characteristics ;  Fear  and  formality — intense  struggle  and 
ceremonialism. 

GRECIANISM 

Evil;  Ugliness  of  the  unpolished  uncouth  world  and  man. 

Cause;  Lack  of  training,  beautifying. 

Means ;  Polish,  physical  and  mental ;  beauty,  imitating  the 
gods  and  reaching  their  perfections  in  body,  wisdom,  art, 
music,  eloquence. 

Characteristics;  Esthetic — artistic  yearning. 

JUDAISM 

Evil;  Sin  as  national  disobedience — ruin  of  the  national 
theocracy. 

Cause;  "The  Fall"  and  renewed  lapses  of  Israel  from 
Yahweh's  moral  commands  in  the  Law  and  the  Prophets. 

Means;  National  regeneration — return  of  Israel  to  Yah- 
weh's kingdom,  the  only  divine  social  order. 

Characteristics;   Subjugated  wills — theocratic  monarchy. 

CHRISTIANITY    (NEO-JUDAISM — PAULINISM  ) 

Evil ;  Sin,  personal  moral  wrong-doing. 

Cause;  "The  Fall"  and  inherited  depravity. 

Means ;  Individual's  regeneration — death  of  individual 
will  in  will  of  God;  spiritual  extension  of  Judaistic  idea  to 
all  the  world. 

Characteristics ;  Good  Will — spontaneous  human  interest, 
active  morality. 


THE  OLD  WORSHIP  AND  THE  NEW        243 


WHAT  IS  COMMON  TO  ALL 

We  should  observe  that  all  these  religions  condemn  the 
common  every-day  world.  All  of  them  look  for  an  ideal 
world.  All  of  them  emphasize  real  evils  in  the  common 
world  life.  All  of  them  promise  relief  and  final  salvation 
from  their  special  evil.  Nearly  all  of  them  make  the  mis- 
take of  looking  for  or  expecting  this  relief  only  in  a  future 
state.  They  are  nearly  all  pessimistic  regarding  the  possi- 
bilities of  a  better  condition  for  man  here  and  now,  and 
all  are  utterly  hopeless  as  to  any  sort  of  ideal  life  on  earth. 

HOW   EACH   IS  INCOMPLETE 

The  most  superficial  view  will  see  that  (as  historically 
represented)  they  are  each  defective  and  incomplete.  They 
have  all  been  narrow.  None  of  them  approach  the  twentieth 
century  conception  of  "the  better  life" — NOW. 

Brahminism  was  devoid  of  Christian  earnestness. 

The  makers  of  the  Persian  Zoroastrian  theory  made  a 
false  dualism  of  nature  hard  and  fast,  and  fancifully  intro- 
duced it  into  all  moral  and  religious  conceptions,  while  it 
degraded  God  by  reiterating  and  clinging  to  crude  and  base 
anthropomorphic  forms. 

Judaism  lacked  the  intellectual  ideals  of  Brahminism  and 
the  esthetic  excellencies  (jf  Grecianism. 

Christianity  in  nearly  all  of  its  historic  types  needed  the 
intellectual  interest  of  the  old  Hindu  thinkers.  On  the  other 
hand  it  borrowed  many  of  the  errors  of  Parseeism  and 
Judaism. 

THEIR  DIFFERENT  VALUED 

H  we  study  the  philosophy  of  these  religions  deeply  we 
shall  see  that  their  values  as  means  of  human  improvement 
are  widely  different.  There  is  no  doubt  but  that  Christianity 
has  laid  hold  upon  the  psychological  factor  which  develops 
social  organization  most,  and  this  directly  and  indirectly 
pushes  man  on  toward  civilization  fastest.     In  many  of  its 


244    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

earlier  historic  phases  it  was  by  no  means  broad  or  inclusive. 
Since  the  Reformation  it  has  been  reaching  out.  Today  at 
its  best,  it  is  taking  up  or  including  many  of  the  various 
aspects  of  human  life. 

Brahmmism  made  the  error  of  putting  a  discount  on 
action.  It  left  out  of  account  the  will,  and  consequently  the 
active  side  of  man's  nature. 

Buddhism  sealed  its  fate  by  discounting  both  the  intellect 
and  the  will.  Its  fundamental  principle  of  sympathy  is  one 
of  the  grandest  and  most  needful  of  human  features.  But 
it  is  only  one. 

The  Greek  religion  was  sensuous.  It  led  easily  to  sensu- 
ality. Sensuality  is  individual  or  self -centered.  Hence 
Grecianism  could  never  evolve  a  human  world  that  is  social 
and  co-operative. 

Christianity  might  have  gone  on  for  indefinite  centuries, 
as  it  did  during  the  Middle  Ages,  exalting  volitional  activity 
and  commending  intellectual  suppression.  This  was  not 
enough.  It  would  thus  have  eventually  produced  its  own 
decay.  From  the  first  it  has  always  advocated,  nay,  it  has 
largely  consisted  in,  or  had  its  dynamic,  in  moral  energy. 
All  systems  of  Hindu  thought  and  of  most  other  ancient 
thought  lack  this. 

The  Chinese  thought  possessed  in  high  degree  a  passive 
morality.     But  passivity  does  not  mean  growth. 

Hindu  thought  and  systems  never  aspired  to  making  man 
true  and  good.  They  left  out  character,  except  incidentally. 
They  taught  men  to  think  and  feel,  but  not  to  act.  The 
typical  Hindu  does  not  yearn  to  improve  or  better  life,  but 
rather  he  flees  from  the  miseries  of  life.  His  remedy  is 
negative.  He  conceives  salvation  to  be  best  attained  by 
inaction.  Hindu  systems  lack  the  elements  which  lead  to 
social  betterment.  They  have  no  psychological  basis  for 
this. 

Christianity  in  most  of  its  types  has  made  liberation  de- 
pend on  certain  forms  of  activity.  In  recent  times  it  has 
here  and  there  been  taking  on  a  still  higher  form.  Christi- 
anity today  is  in  some  respects  higher  than  itself  in  any 


THE  OLD  WORSHIP  AND  THE  NEW        245 

previous  age.  In  occasional  instances  it  is  passing  into 
brighter  hope,  a  broader  world  conception,  and  consequently 
into  a  new  and  brighter  activity  and  usefulness.  In  a  few 
organizations  it  is  outgrowing  its  earlier  limitations.  In 
these  it  is  coming  to  include  the  action  of  other  human 
faculties.  Such  leaders  are  being  corrected  by  the  know- 
ledge of  Science.  They  see  that  past  practices  and  doctrines 
do  not  reach  to  the  full  potentiality  of  "Christian"  manhood. 

CHRISTIAN   ASCETICISM 

In  former  ages  Christians  fasted,  remained  celibate, 
praised  bodily  weakness,  frowned  upon  vigor,  and  exhorted 
men  to  ascetic  abasement.  In  those  times,  too,  the  Church 
(organized  Christianity)  held  itself  as  the  steady  implacable 
enemy  of  all  new  knowledge.  In  the  esthetic,  also,  Christian 
ideals  often  reach  their  highest  expression  in  the  monk's 
robe  and  the  nun's  veil.  The  most  devoted  were  the  most 
prosy.  Often  did  they  denounce  every  kind  of  adornment. 
Fits  of  plainness  have  become  epidemic  and  carried  away 
whole  sects — Quakers,  Puritans,  Dunkards,  Free  Methodists, 
etc.  On  the  other  hand,  large  bodies  of  Christian  advocates 
(Catholics  and  Episcopalians)  have  steadily  developed  doc- 
trine and  practice  along  esthetic  lines.  Its  oldest  historic 
branches  have  made  beauty  in  temple  and  symbol  one  of 
the  chief  ends  of  religious  devotion.  This  is  a  grand  and 
mighty  feature  of  historic  Christianity.  But  it  has  not  been 
its  distinguishing  aim. 

CHRISTIANITY  THE  ONE  SOCIAL  RELIGION 

The  specifically  Christian  salvation,  if  we  have  understood 
the  previous  comparisons,  is  easy  to  determine.  It  exercises 
the  moral  will  and  urges  the  individual  to  active  service 
toward  others.  Christianity  in  this  sense  is  social. 
Grecianism  was  esthetic,  figyplianism  7vas  mystic,  Brahmin- 
ism  was  philosophical,  Buddhism  was  sympathetic,  emo- 
tional,   Persianism    was   formal,    Judaism    was   negatively 


246    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

moral,  but  Christianity  is  positively,  aggressively  moral,  i.  e., 
it  is  social. 

This  element  enters  into  all  the  various  Christian  religions. 
It  is  their  one  thing  in  common.  Consequently  every  form 
of  Christianity  is  a  proselyting  religion.  They  all  make  the 
demand  "Save  Men."  Why?  Because  you  are  supposed 
to  have  a  good  will.  You  have  been  "born  again."  Your 
first  birth  was  to  selfishness.  (Of  course  this  is  not  quite 
true,  since  all  men  are  born  with  some  social  feeling,  even 
though  they  begin  life  with  wholly  self-regarding  instincts.) 
Your  second  birth  is  to  unselfishness.  If  it  is  genuine,  you 
will  take  on  the  Christian  enthusiasm  for  humanity.  That 
made  Jesus  "the  Christ."  In  your  earlier  life  perhaps  you 
have  obeyed  the  negative  law,  the  Decalogue  of  nots.  He  did 
more.  His  real  followers  have  done  as  he.  Hence' 
Christianity  has  been  the  most  aggressive  of  religions.  Its 
enthusiasm  for  the  social  regard  has  sent  missions  all  over 
the  world.  Their  theory  has  not  always  been  clear  but  their 
root  was  social.  Sisters  of  Charity,  Brotherhoods  of  Mercy, 
schools,  churches,  have  followed  wherever  even  a  low 
Christian  spirit  entered. 

Other  religions  do  other  things,  and  important  things — 
not  these. 

Gradually,  in  this  spirit,  man  is  being  elevated  in  other 
ways  beyond  the  social.  The  newer  Christian  theory  of 
man's  worth  is  advancing.  The  old  Christian  view  set  man 
so  low  and  God  relatively  so  high  that  progress  was  discour- 
aged. The  new  Christian  view  is  placing  man  higher  and 
God  here  and  everywhere.  Someone  has  quaintly  expressed 
this  change  in  verse. 

"The  parish  priest 

Of  Austerlitz 
Climbed  up  a  high   church  steeple. 

To  be  near  God, 

That  he  might  hand 
God's  word  down  to  the  people. 


THE  OLD  WORSHIP  AND  THE  NEW        247 

In  sermons  grave, 

He  daily  wrote 
What  he  thought  sent  from  heaven; 

And  dropped  this  on 

The  peoples'  heads. 
Two  times  one  day  in  seven. 

In  rage  God  said, 

'What  meanest  thou?' 
The  priest  cried  from  the  steeple, 

'Where  art  thou  Lord?' 

The  Lord  replied, 
'Down  here  among  my  people." " 


CHRISTIANITY  CAPABLL:  OF  EXPANDING 

The  evidence  for  Jesus's  human  enthusiasm  is  found  in 
such  original  teachings  as  the  parables  of  the  Good  Samari- 
tan, Pharisee  and  Pubhcan,  the  Rich  Man  and  Lazarus,  the 
Great  Supper,  the  Lost  Sheep,  the  Prodigal  Son,  the  Ten 
Virgins,  the  Sheep  and  Goats,  and  so  on.  We  need  not  take 
them  in  any  literal  or  doctrinal  sense.  They  are  full  of  the 
idea  of  action  and  interest,  of  the  conception  of  regenerated 
will.  The  Beatitudes  teach  self -discipline,  the  Parables  teach 
self-sacrifice.  Both  together  mean  moral  development.  And 
morality  is  active  good-will.  In  the  New  Testament  this  is 
not  elaborated.  There  we  have  simply  the  germs  of  the 
great  discovery.  There  are  the  seeds  of  the  Christianity 
which  in  our  times  might  flower  into  a  greater  fruitage. 

THE  COMING  WORSHIP 

The  Christianity  which  r)ught  to  be  today  realized,  the 
Christianity  which  as  an  ideal  fills  the  minds  of  thousands, 
is  not  what  Jesus  said.  It  is  not  what  the  New  Testament 
taught.  It  is  not  the  historic  Church  doctrines.  It  is  a 
more  expanded  exem[)lification  of  the  spirit  and  tendency 
which  filled  his  life.  The  great  desideratum  is  to  add  to  his 
spirit  our  twentieth  century  enlightenment.     This  shall  solve 


248    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

the  knotty  problems  of  life.  With  it  the  pains  of  man  and 
society  shall  disappear.  In  more  traditional  religious 
phrase,  it  will  be  "the  power  of  Jesus"  plus  "the  power  of 
Science,"  the  pozver  of  noble  character  added  to  the  power 
of  great  knowledge.  These  are  the  two  greatest  powers  the 
world  has  ever  known  and  together  they  will  combine  into 
a  still  greater. 

It  is  clear  that  there  is  now  taking  place  a  wondrous 
change  in  the  human  outlook.  It  is  a  change  which  is  not 
destructive.  It  is  the  most  broadening  and  constructive 
movement  ever  experienced  by  mankind.  It  is  saving  the  vital 
elements  from  the  old ;  while  at  the  same  time  it  is  enlarging 
and  quite  remaking  the  Christian  outlook.  Though  differ- 
ently explained,  the  primitive  Christian  seriousness  and 
essence  is  the  same,  but  it  is  getting  a  larger  setting  and  a 
broader  and  more  splendid  application.  Because  of  their 
unsocial  psychological  natures,  this  would  probably  have 
been  impossible  with  every  other  ancient  religion.  Chris- 
tianity is  comparatively  flexible  and  capable  of  growth,  and 
the  reason  for  this  is,  it  is  grounded  in  broader  psychology. 
But  it  has  yet  to  adopt  a  deeper  strength  than  "belief";  a 
better  foundation  than  myth  or  legend,  infallible  book  or 
infallible  pope;  better  arguments  than  wrathful  gods  and 
infernal  threats ;  and  better  occupation  than  praying  for 
things  which  man  himself  must  accomplish. 

Indeed,  the  Christianiiy  of  today  must  yearn  for  more 
truth  than  the  old  Brahmins  knew;  for  purity  more  thorough 
than  the  old  Persians  imagined;  for  sympathy  more  helpful 
and  inclusive  than  a  Buddhist  ever  dreamed;  for  a  social 
harmony  and  righteousness  eclipsing  any  Hebrew  concep- 
tion; for  an  art  and  a  beauty  molding  and  infusing  all  life 
into  that  splendor  with  which  Phidias'  hand  bedecked  the 
Greek  Acropolis. 

The  spirit  and  zeal  of  Jesus,  filled  with  the  enlightenment 
of  Modern  Science,  enthused  by  the  lessons  of  history,  in- 
spired  by   other   rare   lives   of   the   past — such   religion   is 


THE  OLD  WORSHIP  AND  THE  NEW        249 

possible  today.  It  will  fill  man  with  a  higher  love  for  truth, 
replace  tradition  by  demonstration,  substitute  investigation 
for  memory,  and  teach  hope  and  growth  to  all  men.  This 
will  bring  out  what  has  been  called  the  potential  Divinity 
of  humanity.  This  might  give  some  color  to  the  fond 
remark  that  men  are  gods  in  embryo. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 
ON  THE  DIVIDE 

BREAKING  CAMP 

For  many  centuries,  the  part  of  humanity  called  Christen- 
dom has  been  comfortably  camped  on  the  level  plains  of  a 
social  and  religious  territory  bequeathed  through  traditions 
from  ancient  peoples. 

It  is  now  clear  that  in  recent  times,  the  explorations  of 
numerous  men  called  Discoverers  and  Scientists  have  been 
so  extensive,  so  profound,  in  every  department  of  human 
interest,  that  an  entire  reconstruction  of  world-outlook 
(Cosmology)  has  taken  place  in  their  minds.  They  have 
"broken  camp,"  and  moved  the  van  of  thought  forward. 
They  have  "climbed  the  range" — are  "above  timberline,"  "on 
the  Divide." 

From  this  height  they  discover  that  the  world  is  not  the 
stationary,  flat  plain  of  the  Ancients,  but  is  a  revolving 
sphere.  They  are  telling  the  story  of  how  this  globe-world 
came  into  being.  They  are  reading  its  history  from  the 
leaves  of  its  strata.  They  are  tracing  out  the  records  of  the 
myriad  forms  of  evolving  life  on  its  surface.  They  are 
peering  out  into  interstellar  depths  and  finding  "creation"  in 
all  stages  of  development.  They  are  now  restudying  man's 
record  and  pedigree  and  learning  things  marvelously  inter- 
esting. 

BY  ORDER  OF  SCIENCE 

They  have  backed  up  their  statements  with  facts.  At 
least  most  of  us  are  quietly  accepting  them  as  facts.  We 
are  allowing  them  to  be  introduced  as  text-books  into  all 

250 


ON  THE  DIVIDE  251 

our  schools  and  colleges  under  the  titles  of  Astronomy, 
Geology,  Physics,  Chemistry,  Biology,  Botany,  Zoology, 
Anthropology,  Psychology,  Sociology,  etc.  Through  these 
texts  they  have  given  orders  for  the  whole  race  to  break 
camp,  to  scale  the  range,  and  behold  a  cosmos  of  greater 
opportunity — but  they  are  not  enforcing  the  orders. 

WHAT  THE  ORDERS  LACK 

They  have  summed  up  everything,  written  on  everything, 
pushed  the  claims  of  the  "Scientific  Method"  for  everything 
— except  Religion  and  Sociology.  Here  their  work  is  feeble. 
On  these  they  hesitate.  The  chief  reason  is  because  of  the 
supposedly  strongly  organized  character  of  the  surviving 
representatives  of  ancient  religious  outlooks.  These  repre- 
sentatives (desiring  to  appear  progressive)  have  climbed  the 
foothills  of  knowledge  with  much  parade,  and  with  their 
backs  toward  the  majestic  heights  beyond,  they  resurvey  the 
old  traditional  plains  and  ostentatiously  re-announce 
these  to  the  people  as  the  limits  of  Divine  intention. 

These  leaders  are  educated  "exclusively."  They  study 
only  (or  mostly)  the  ancient  world-outlook  (in  Cosmology 
and  Anthropolog}')  ;  and  they  do  this  systematically  and 
thoroughly  in  their  "Schools  of  Theology."  By  a  world- 
wide system  of  "Churches"  (popular  schools  for  religious 
traditions),  they  keep  before  the  masses  and  nearly  control 
their  general  \iew  of  things. 

Hence  the  situation — that  although  "The  Scientific  Move- 
ment" is  a  century  old,  and  although  it  has  now  nearly 
complete  control  in  every  civilized  land  over  all  the  affairs 
of  material  and  mental  advancement,  it  has  made  only  a 
beginning  in  the  direction  of  religious  and  social  reconstruc- 
tion. 

In  this  aspect  of  life  we  are  between  two  ages.  As  things 
nr)w  stand,  we  are  in  confusion.  The  clergy  and  their 
ariherents  are  "touched  by  Modern  Thought."  They  arc  in 
a  position  of  apologetic  explanation.  They  are  putting  the 
ancient  doctrines  forth  less  boldly,  and  with  the  attempt  to 


252    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

read  into  them  modern  facts  and  meanings.  They  have  not 
grasped  the  gist  of  scientific  advance,  and  consequently  do 
not  reahze  the  hopelessness  of  their  own  efforts. 

LEAVING  TRADITION — NOT   YET  TO  SCIENCE 

The  period  of  the  breaking  down  of  old  religious  outlooks 
is  not  merely  interesting — it  is  dangerous.  On  religious 
confidence  rests  character.  On  character  rest  conduct  and 
patriotism.  On  these  rest  social  and  national  stability. 
Their  decay  undermines  nations.  Several  times  during 
human  history  has  this  train  of  conditions  been  clearly 
shown.  The  procession  and  then  the  fall — these  make 
"history." 

The  mistakes  were  made  and  the  great  breaks  came 
through  thinking  of  religious  doctrines  as  unchangeable. 
They  became  so  fixed  as  to  crystallize.  Then  modification 
was  impossible.  Great  waves  of  thought  came,  but  the 
clerically  inculcated  misoneism  of  the  masses,  their  hatred 
of  the  new,  resisted  until  the  power  to  lift  them  onward 
was  spent  and  gone. 

HITTING  THE  TRAIL 

In  the  process  of  the  centuries,  such  a  condition  is  again 
here.  New  and  better  knowledge  is  abundant.  Old  methods 
and  conclusions  are  being  deserted.  But  new  methods  and 
conclusions  are  not  fully  ready  to  take  their  place.  Many 
and  earnest  efforts  are  under  way.  They  are  doing  good 
work.  The  inroads  against  hereditary  dogma  are  consid- 
erable. And  yet  the  clearly  understood  substitutes  for  it 
are  meagre,  poorly  arranged,  and  inadequately  supported. 

The  great  and  lamentable  fact  is,  the  majorities  are  mov- 
ing little  or  none.  Small  bands  are  struggling  up  the  range. 
Here  and  there  one  is  nearing  the  heights.  These  are  shout- 
ing about  the  glorious  views,  fore  and  aft — of  the  vast 
perspective  over  past  and  future. 


I 


ON  THE  DIVIDE  253 


TUGGING  UP  TOGETHER 

Seeing  thus  the  need,  what  is  our  part?  To  continue 
the  figure  every  individual  on  the  trail  is  striving  toward 
that  reconstruction  spoken  of  above — more  especially  in 
religious  outlook,  and  thus  is  helping  onward  the  consequent 
social  reorganization.  Along  with  others — we  are  all 
trying  to — 

Sum  up  the  new  truths, 

Encourage  the  new  science, 

Quicken  the  new  reasoning  conscience, 

Make  way  for  the  new  aspirations, 

Point  mankind  forward,  not  backward. 

Replace  old  gloom  with  new  hope, 

Broaden  religion  to  coincide  with  knowledge. 

Widen  sociology  till  it  plans  for  mankind  instead  of  classes. 

SOME  VANGUARD  PROSPECTS  AND  HOPES 

To  represent  and  recommend  scientific  facts  as  the  basis  in 
religious  and  social  thought. 

To  do  this  by  discourses,  investigations,  scientific  results,  and 
suggestions  bearing  on  these  field.s. 

To  afford  opportunity  for  learning  the  nature  of  the  great 
religious  movement  magnificently  forwarded  by  Emerson  and 
continued  by  a  host  of  noble  workers  and  investigators. 

To  stimulate  the  work  of  social  reorganization  believed  in  by 
the  most  humane  thinkers  from  Plato  till  today. 

To  show  the  further  advance  of  these  movements  on  the  basis 
and  with  the  aid  of  myriad  discoveries. 

To  speak  plainly  and  tell  truths  calmly  which,  though  often 
told,  are  yet  little  heeded  by  the  general  public. 

To  be  kindly  critical  of  doctrines  and  practices,  obsolete,  yet 
surviving. 

To  be  definitely  constructive  in  trying  to  show  the  direction 
of  advancing  thought. 

To  encourage  inquiry  and  call  attention  to  the  folly  and  infi- 
delity of  those  who  try  to  stifie  it. 

To  keep  clear  the  fact  that  we  are  between  ages,  that  we  are 
leaving  the  "traditions  of  the  past"  and  that  we  have  not  yet 
arrived  at  the  "faith  of  the  future" 

To  point  out  the  danger.s  of  a  Rr-ligious  Interregnum. 

To  do  all  possible  to  answer  the  question     during  the  uncer- 


254    A    RECEIVERSHIP   FOR    CIVILIZATION 

tain  interim — Wliat?  Wliat  may  we  believe  today?  How  must 
we  act? 

To  lend  no  encouragement  to  the  puerile  and  immoral  custom 
of  making  fantastic  claims  in  religion  and  sociology  that  are 
preposterous  in  other  fields  of  life. 

To  affirm  nothing  merely  on  yesterday's  authority — supported 
only  by  yesterday's  so-called  "sacred  books." 

To  strive  to  substitute  natural  reasons  for  Jewish  reasons. 

To  avoid,  also,  claims  based  on  speculation,  on  mystical  senti- 
ments, as  well  as  on  proof  by  numbers  and  majorities. 

To  be  always  open  to  those  thoughts — and  those  only,  which 
are  reasonable  teachings  based  on  facts  acknowledged  by  today's 
light. 

To  greet  heartily  discoveries,  discussions,  articles,  books, 
magazines,  etc.,  which  aim  in  these  directions. 

To  make  chiefly  prominent  the  fact  that  what  is  true  and,  in 
the  long  run,  helpful  in  any  religion,  is  the  part  which  accords 
with  natural  law  as  revealed  by  the  tests  and  verifications  of 
Science. 

To  do  this  work  in  the  spirit  of  profound  reverence  for  all  that 
is  true  and  good  and  beautiful. 

GET  USED  TO  IT 

We  might  as  well  practice  and  get  the  habit.  Sooner, 
not  much  later,  we  shall  all  question  nearly  all  of  the  the- 
ories, the  practices,  the  morals,  and  the  institutions  of  the 
past.  Its  intellect  was  too  limited,  its  interests  too  narrow, 
its  sympathies  too  selfish,  and  its  methods  too  unscrupulous 
to  satisfy  the  ideals  of  this  age  of  increasingly  honest  scien- 
tific research. 

I  said  "all."  I  mean  that  all  who  have  awakened  enough 
and  have  morals  enough  will  doubt  and  discard  as  rules  of 
their  lives,  all  the  narrow  conceptions  and  ideals  of  the 
world's  yesterdays.  Their  little  Medi-terra-nean  world  and 
their  tribal  and  racial  morals  are  in  ridiculous  contrast  to 
the  Cosmos  of  Science,  the  Limitless  Universe,  the  Evolu- 
tional Morality,  the  Universal  Kin.ship  of  Life,  the  Common 
Human  Brotherhood  of  Mankind  that  fill  the  minds  of  all 
people  who  are  really  alive  today. 

It  will  take  all  the  intelligence,  courage,  honesty,  love  of 
truth,  righteousness,  and  honor  that  we  can  muster  to  rise 
to  these  questions.     It  is  a  test  of  manhood  few  in  former 


ON  THE  DIVIDE  255 

generations  could  stand  to  have  things,  theories,  examples 
that  have  been  cherished  for  centuries  put  in  doubt  and 
de-idealized. 

But  it's  coming.  Not  by  our  degenerating  to  or  accepting 
lower  standards.  We  are  going  on  to  broader,  higher  ones. 
We  have  better  reasons,  and  we  are  getting  more  of  them. 
Our  expansion  of  knowledge,  our  scientific  methods  have 
taught  better  things  than  the  Past  ever  knew.  They  have 
given  us  depth  of  moral  insight  and  breadth  of  moral  sym- 
pathies that  no  ancient  ever  felt.  To  hesitate  and  sulk  and 
quote  will  only  further  show  how  little  we  are  living  in 
today's  light.  We  cannot  believe  in  development,  progress, 
evolution  and  still  cling  to  tradition.  Traditions  are  useful 
to  hold  in  check  the  passions  of  the  vicious  and  ignorant — 
the  classes  who  cannot  grow.  Those  who  are  not  arrested 
in  development,  those  who  are  normal  products  of  evolution, 
are  now  too  numerous  to  further  tolerate  attempted  hin- 
drance to  their  growth. 


'New  occasions  teach  new  duties; 
Time  makes  ancient  good  uncouth; 
They  must  upward  still,  and  onward, 
Who  would  keep  abreast  of  truth. 
Lo,  before  us  gleam  her  camp-fires; 
We  ourselves  must  pilgrims  be; 
Launch  our  Mayflower,  and  steer  boldly 
Through  the  desperate  winter  sea, 
Nor  attempt  the  Future's  portals 
With  the  Past's  blood-rusted  key. 

Once  to  every  man  and  nation 
Comes  the  moment  to  decide. 
In  the  strife  of  Truth  with  Falsehood, 
For  the  good  or  evil  side." 

LOWELL — Present  Crisis. 


256 


CHAPTER  XXV 
FREEDOM— RELIGION— CHURCH 

HOW    FAR    COMMENSURABLE? 

FREEDOM — WHAT  FOR? 

The  "American  Sentinal"  awhile  ago  said:  "It  is  the  inalien- 
able right  of  every  man  to  profess  any  religion  or  none,  Just 
as  he  chooses.  No  association  of  religious  people  has  any  right 
to  compel  those  who  are  not  religious  to  act  as  though  they 
were,  or  to  conform  to  any  religious  observance,  or  to  recognize 
any  religious  institution." 

This  statement  is  based  on  misconception  or  upon  narrow 
or  traditional  use  of  the  term  religion.  Society  is  now  in  a 
position  to  allow  much  individual  freedom.  When  freedom 
is  granted,  half-informed  and  noisy  people  indulge  in  a  deal 
of  after-bravado  about  it.  "Men  are  free."  Yes,  but  only 
to  make  progress.  They  are  not  free  not  to  make  progress. 
'"Every  man  has  a  right  to  profess  any  religion  he  chooses," 
but  he  has  no  right  to  profess  no  religion  if  that  means  to 
live  irreligiously,  i.  e.,  unseriously  or  unearnestly.  He  can 
make  new  definitions  or  new  religions,  if  he  knows  enough, 
and  if  those  he  finds  do  not  accord  with  his  reason.  Every 
man  born  into  the  world  learns  something  about  that  world 
and  holds  what  he  learns  as  his  "faith."  He  has  no  right 
not  to  learn.  No  other  individual  should  meddle  with  his 
learning;  but  society  holds  him  responsible  and  demands 
that  he  do  learn,  and  that  he  act  according  to  the  light  he 
obtains.  He  owes  this  to  society  which  gives  him  birth  and 
protection,  and  society  demands  it  of  him.  Not  that  he  join 
or  recognize  this  or  that  religious  institution,  but  that  he 

257 


258    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

join  some  movement  or  that  he  start  another  and  thus  use 
his  force.  Every  individual  is,  whether  he  wills  or  not,  a 
responsible  member  of  society.  He  has  no  right  to  do  as  he 
pleases,  if  he  pleases  to  yield  to  primitive  impulses  or  not 
to  strive  toward  higher.  His  rights  are  to  do  all  he  can  in  the 
tvay  which  seems  to  him  wisest  and  best.  Hence  the  fallacy 
of  the  boast  that  a  man  has  a  right  to  do  as  he  chooses. 
All  history  contradicts  this.  Society  never  recognized  it. 
Its  assertion  is  but  wildness.  It  is  seldom  claimed  by  people 
filled  with  the  sense  of  duty.  The  loudest  ravings  about 
freedom  often  come  from  those  who  misuse,  or  do  not  use, 
the  freedom  they  have.  Sometimes  they  are  the  idle,  the 
vicious,  the  irate,  the  uncurable. 

THE  RIGHT  OF  PROTEST 

Except  when  the  State  is  in  common  danger  from  with- 
out, men  have  ever  the  natural  right  to  dissent,  if  their 
judgment  contradicts,  but  dissent  carries  with  it  always  a 
still  greater  responsibility.  He  who  dissents  from  what  is, 
is  bound  by  the  very  nature  of  human  life  to  try  to  establish 
something  better.  But  the  average  faultfinder  is  not  always 
this  sort  of  person.  There  is  today  a  type  who  dissents  not 
because  he  is  going  to  set  up  something  better,  but  because 
he  is  going  to  sit  down  and  do  nothing.  On  some  such 
negative  grounds  do  a  part  of  that  64,000,000  unchurched 
people  seek  a  sham  justification  for  their  shirking  practices. 

FREEDOM  TO  DO  NOTHING 

When  in  the  course  of  human  events  civilization  had 
advanced  far  enough  to  grant  the  demands  of  those  who 
were  intelligent  enough  to  ask  for  freedom,  there  was  be- 
lieved to  be  great  danger  that  in  giving  it  to  these  it  would 
be  taken  by  those  who  would  use  it  as  license.  To  Luther 
and  the  reformers  who  protested  against  too  narrow  Church 
authority,  the  demand  for  freedom  might  have  been  un- 
grudgingly and  perhaps  safely  granted.    And  the  cause  of 


FREEDOM— RELIGION— CHURCH  259 

righteousness  did  not  suffer  when  they  wrenched  it  from 
the  grudging  authorities,  since  they  with  redoubled  energy 
undertook  to  substitute  for  the  old  a  more  practicable  and 
effective  new.  But  the  doors  that  swung  open  to  let  out 
these  heroic  workers  let  out  also  tenfold  as  many  would-be- 
idlers.  There  are  now,  and  have  been  in  every  age,  a  host 
of  survivals  who  will  perform  no  more  of  their  public  duties 
than  the  public  compels  them  to.  Hence  when  the  public 
gives  them  liberty  to  choose,  they  simply  choose  not  to 
choose  at  all. 

Taken  as  a  whole,  no  people  or  nation  has  ever  been 
developed  far  enough  so  that  the  granting  of  freedom  to 
all  has  proven  a  thoroughly  safe  thing.  Not  even  that  most 
admirable  people  the  Greeks.  Among  them  were  many  too 
ignorant  and  too  selfish  to  profit  by  the  enjoyment  of  such 
a  boon.  So  too  the  Hebrezvs,  the  Romans,  the  Swiss,  the 
French,  and  even  that  great  people  who  live  beneath  the 
wings  of  the  American  Eagle.  These  and  others  have  tried 
the  experiment  of  popular  government.  This  means  freedom 
to  vote.  But  freedom  to  vote  implies  the  intelligence  of 
knowing  how,  and  it  carries  with  it  the  responsibility  of  not 
slinking  out  of  the  duty. 

OTHER  "rights" 

And  so  of  all  human  rights.  They  are  "rights"  only 
when  there  is  intelligence  and  character  enough  to  insure 
their  being  used.  No  man  has  any  "right"  to  political  or 
religious  freedom  who  does  not  know  enough  or  is  not  good 
enough  to  strive  to  use  that  freedom  for  the  world  of  which 
he  forms  a  part.  Every  man  who  would  neglect  his  |>oliti- 
cal  duties  or  his  religious  associations  ou,i,dU  lo  he  under  a 
department  of  social  vigilance  which  would  insure  the  per- 
formance of  such  duties  as  can  be  extracted  from  such 
ignorance  and  selfishness.  But  this  i*^  too  ditTicult  for  roni- 
plete  achievement. 


26o     A    RECEIVERSHIP    EOR    CIVILIZATION 


WHY  REPUBLICS  HAVE  FALLEN 

And  wc  1WZV  come  to  the  uncovering  of  a  great  secret. 
It  is  just  because  of  these  reasons  that  the  republics  and 
liberal  churches  of  the  world  have  not  been  greater  suc- 
cesses. They  require  freedom.  Ereedom  without  intelH- 
gence  is  ruin.  This  tells  us  why  Greece  went  down,  why 
Rome  fell  into  the  hands  of  her  plutocratic  ambitious 
schemers,  why  the  French  Republic  cut  off  the  heads  of  so 
many  of  its  own  citizens  that  there  were  not  left  enough 
freedom-lovers  to  sustain  a  government,  and  why  these 
United  States  of  America  are  now  in  such  a  condition  of 
turmoil.  And  again  it  explains  to  us  why  Unitarianisni  has 
not  faster  advanced,  and  why  other  "liberals,"  so  called,  have 
made  such  feeble  efforts  to  reform  the  world.  On  the  very 
face  of  it  is  written  as  large  as  its  history  the  fact  that  the 
desire  for  liberty  and  opportunity  of  a  large  proportion  was 
not  the  desire  for  liberty  and  opportunity  to  think  freely 
and  to  work  for  humanity.  They  wanted  the  liberty  and 
opportunity  to  do  nothing,  to  gratify  their  self- regarding 
instincts  unmolested,  to  be  free  even  from  the  restraints 
which  the  old  and  less  intelligent  order  placed  upon  them. 

WHO  IS  TO  DO  THE  RESTRAINING? 

The  restraint  may  come  from  the  wrong  source.  Those 
in  authority  who  would  restrain  others  are  themselves  often 
the  very  class  who  deserve  the  most  restraining.  This  is 
notorious.  Erequently  senatorial  and  executive  bodies  are 
among  the  greatest  misusers  of  the  freedom  granted  by  our 
present  stage  of  evolution. 

Again,  we  are  always  mistaking  the  place  where  the  re- 
straint is  most  needed.  The  wealthy,  well-to-do  rulers  of 
society  and  church  keep  the  world's  attention  off  themselves 
by  continuously  raising  the  question  as  to  whether  "those 
ignorant  lower  classes"  should  be  allowed  "a  measure  of 
freedom."  Their  complacency  and  assumption  have  hyp- 
notized nations  all  down  the  centuries.     The  middle  class 


FREEDOM— RELIGION— CHURCH  261 

thus  fails  to  see  the  need,  and  the  so-called  lower  class  has 
stupidly  allowed  it  to  be  assumed  that  they  are  the  least 
deserving.  Their  complacent  acceptance  balances  the  com- 
placent assumption  of  the  others.  The  fact  is,  most  of 
those  who  have  made  the  best  use  of  freedom  have  not 
come  from  "higher"  realms  of  society.  Those  who  have 
made  the  worst  use  of  it  are  not  always  from  the  so-called 
lower  classes. 

The  "upper  classes"  have  everlastingly  told  the  world 
that  the  "great  problem"  is  the  "lower  classes."  The  fact 
is  that  their  unrestrained  greed  helps  both  to  make  and 
continue  that  "lower  class,"  who  are  the  petty  abusers.  But 
this  great  problem  of  civilization  is  quite  as  much  the  self- 
assuming  "upper  class"  itself,  the  colossal  abusers  of 
freedom. 

YET  FREEDOM    MUST  NOT  BE  RESTRAINED 

This  then  is  the  crucial  difficulty.  Men  want  freedom; 
but  society  wants  it  used  for  good.  The  progress  of  the 
world  continually  brings  more  of  it.  There  are  ages  when 
it  comes  exceedingly  slowly.  There  are  other  ages  when  it 
comes  almost  too  fast.  Ours  is  one  of  these,  and  yet  we 
would  not  have  one  whit  of  it  taken  back.  It  is  a  too  dearly 
bought  product.  It  must  be  liberally  granted.  And  then 
its  right  use  must  be  diligently  urged. 

There  are  masses  in  the  Church  who  neither  desire,  de- 
serve, nor  get  any  religious  freedom.  So  too  there  are 
multitudes  outside  the  Church  who  do  not  deserve  their 
political  opportunities,  and  who  daily  misuse  the  religious 
freedom  which  they  have  inherited  from  our  common 
ancestry.  They  take  this  opportunity  as  license  for  their 
do-nothing  tendency. 

WHENCE  THE  PROBLEM  ? 

Now  one  of  the  greatest  causes  for  this  indifference  and 
license  lies  at  the  floor  of  the  Church  itself.  Its  own 
lethargy  gives  a  pretext  for  the  lethargy  of  those  who  lounge 


262     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

outside  its  doors.     Had   il    the   intelligent   life  it  ought,   it 
would  infuse  life  and  puq>ose  into  the  world  without. 

Humanity  as  a  whole  has  been  changing  its  authorities 
and  its  standards.  The  Church  as  a  whole  retains  as  nearly 
as  possible  the  same  authorities,  and  doggedly  insists  on  the 
same  standards,  while  all  around  it  is  clear  that  development 
has  reached  a  stage  in  which  these  cannot  be.  Hence  the 
Church  is  deserted  by  hundreds  of  the  more  intelligent  and 
by  thousands  of  the  more  indifferent.  Somehow  or  other, 
the  belief  is  spreading  that  the  Church  does  not  and  cannot 
fill  the  needs,  that  it  is  not  in  possession  of  the  ideals  which 
are  interesting  in  our  conditions.  And  for  this  belief  there 
is  not  a  little  ground.  He  who  has  the  least  understanding 
of  the  situation  will  admit  that  it  is  partly  true.  I  am  not 
unkind  nor  bold  when  I  say,  that  had  the  Church  (as  a 
whole)  a  doctrine  which  it  could  make  reasonable  to  men 
they  would  not  be  crying  out  in  friendless  social  discontent. 
We  would  not  have  our  thousands  of  multi-millionaires 
greedily  appropriating  everything  and  our  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  begging  starving,  unemployed  men  going  with- 
out anything.  There  would  not  have  been  that  intemperance 
which  has  been  costing  the  nation  from  one  to  two  billions 
a  year,  twenty  times  as  much  as  for  all  educational  enter- 
prises combined.  And  there  could  not  be  the  results  of 
these  conditions  by  which  crime  is  increasing  five  times  as 
fast  as  the  population  increases.  Through  luxury  on  the 
one  hand  and  through  need  on  the  other,  such  vices  as 
prostitution  and  theft  are  practically  necessitated.  Where 
the  rich  make  pleasure  their  occupation,  the  necessities  of 
the  poor  make  them  the  prostitutes  of  the  rich.  Once 
started  and  under  headway,  these  conditions  increase  them- 
selves. 

THE  CHURCH  ITSELF  HAS  CHIEF  NEED  OF  BEING  SAVED 

Among  the  forces  designed  to  stem  the  tide  against  such 
conditions,  the  Church  is  first  and  fundamental.  Unless  it 
wakes  up  and  gets  the  needed  information  to  see  and  teach 


FREEDOM— RELIGION— CHURCH  263 

the  direful  consequences  of  these  evils,  a  still  greater  age 
of  license  is  ahead.  The  great  material  successes  of  our 
nation  and  of  the  whole  modern  world  still  further  foster 
such  deplorable  possibilities.  Our  only  safey  consists  in 
arousing  ourselves  for  the  work  by  great  scientific  and  moral 
movements. 

To  help  in  this  we  cannot  depend  upon  large  masses  in 
the  Church.  They  have  become  a  part  of  the  thing  to  be 
corrected.  Some  of  it  already  is  a  vast  and  unwholesome 
political  power.  Some  of  its  ranks  are  filled,  to  a  great 
extent,  by  ignorant  devotees,  and  it  will  become  the  tool  of 
unscrupulous  political  or  of  bigoted  ecclesiastical  aspirants. 

The  greater  part  of  the  religious  world  lacks  an  adequate, 
intelligent,  doctrinal  foundation  on  which  to  labor  for  a  safe 
and  reconstructed  social  order.  A  few  of  the  churches  and 
quite  a  number  of  the  ministers  are  doing  royal  work  in  pro- 
claiming the  glad  tidings  of  Science  and  of  better  days  and 
of  warning  men  against  "the  wrath  that  is  to  come"  from 
the  violations  of  natural  social  laws.  But  in  so  far  as  thev 
are  doing  this  they  are  going  beyond  their  system.  It  does 
not  belong  to  their  doctrine.  In  theory  they  hold  this  zvnrld 
to  he  a  wreck.  And  man  is  to  be  saved  only  by  God's  de- 
ferring grace  in  some  future  state.  The  true  logic  of  their 
premises  would  be  to  destroy  society  as  soon  as  possible. 

Auguste  Comte  said :  "No  nation  or  people  ever  outln'cd 
its  religion."  The  decay  of  ancient  nations  was  preceded 
in  every  case  by  the  decay  of  their  religions.  Modern 
enlightenment  is  again  doing  away  with  traditional  religious 
beliefs.  Are  we  getting  a  truer  religion  in  their  place? 
Or  are  we  indifferent?  And  if  so  helping  on  national  doom? 
One  or  the  other  is  not  very  far  away. 


PART    SIX 
A    HIGHER    EFFICIENCY    HAILED 


CHAPTER  XXVI 
THE  OUGHT-TO-BE  CHURCH 

THE  ESSENCE  OF  RELIGION 

Religion  at  its  best  is  idealization.  Thus  considered  it  is 
life  aspiring,  yearning  for  better  conditions.  The  Church 
is  assumed  to  be  organized  effort  for  propagating  ideal 
disposition,  inclination.  Hence  true  religion  is  a  pioneering 
movement.  Traditionalism  is  a  living  in  the  old  country. 
Traditionalism  is  therefore  unreligion.  An  ideal  is  an  idea 
leaning  forward. 

Religion  is  eager,  it  is  rational  selection.  It  exists  in 
planes.  What  is  religion  to  low  intelHgences,  is  ignorance, 
superstition,  unreligion  to  higher  grades.  Hence  arise  con- 
flicts, heresy,  creed  revisions.  Hence  also  expulsions  of  the 
higher  by  the  lower. 

The  Church  must  therefore  inevitably  represent  various 
grades  of  intelligence,  varying  temperaments  and  differing 
psychological  attitudes — i.  e.  denominations.  An  organiza- 
tion cannot  hold  together  elements  that  are  too  different. 

The  Church  then  cannot  include  all  in  one  type  of  organi- 
zation.    All  elements  cannot  co-exist  in  one  compound. 

Given  a  sufficient  psychological  likeness  of  individuals, — 

264 


THE  OUGHT-TO-BE  CHURCH  265 


WHAT   CAN   AND  SHOULD  A   CHURCH   INCLUDE? 

This  can  not  be  settled  by  tradition.  Tradition  prevents 
variation  and  hinders  the  new.  We  must  appeal  to  facts 
as  they  are,  now,  today.  A  church  is  necessarily  a  group  of 
individuals  with  some  sort  of  affinities. 

They  are  grouped  because  they  can  group.  Grouping  is 
cooperation.     It  is  for  this. 

Religion  is  for  inspiration,  for  renewing  energy,  life,  for 
reaching  onward.  The  Church  is  or  should  be  the  union 
of  minds  in  this  state  in  cooperative  eflFort. 

SOME  ANALOGIES 

Nature's  mode  of  being  is  in  ions,  electrons,  atoms,  mole- 
cules, masses,  worlds,  systems. 

Man's  mode  of  existence  is  the  same  in  all  sorts  of  efforts. 
A  great  newspaper  has  its  departments  to  procure  news  of 
the  week;  American,  Foreign,  Sociological,  Literary,  Ar- 
tistic, Scientific,  Religious,  etc.  The  American  Association 
for  the  Advancement  of  Science  exists  in  sections  for 
Astronomy,  Geology,  Physics,  Chemistry,  Biology,  Botany, 
Zoology,  Psychology,  Sociology,  Anthropology.  Each  sec- 
tion is  a  molecule  of  the  greater  mass. 

And  so  of  states  and  nations  and  all  their  divisions. 

THE  CHURCH    MAKES   ITSELF  AN    EXCEPTION    IN   ALL   NATURE 

In  all  these  there  is  system  and  the  study  of  fact.  In 
these,  men  do  not  study  ancient  facts,  nor  magic,  nor  commit 
ancient  books.  Only  in  one  backward  survival  do  they  do 
these  things.  Everywhere,  but  here,  men  are  making  pro- 
gress purposely.  Here  it  is  accidental  or  compulsor}'. 
Iwerywhere  but  here  invention  of  methods  and  means,  and 
depth  of  insight  are  welcomed.  The  theological  schools 
and  the  clergy  as  a  professional  group  have  now  reached 
the  foot  of  the  class.  They  have  for  centuries  given  the 
prize  to  dullness,  until  they  are  today  the  most  backward 
of  the  professions.  They  have  for  aqes  expelled  their  most 
original  Minds.     Hence  the  present  deplorable  condition; 


266     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

uiiiufonued   men    preaching   a   zvorld- outlook    that    the   in- 
formed world  has  left  behind. 

HENCE  THE  CHURCH   IS  OPPOSING  RELIGION 

Now  this  is  the  opposite  of  relij^ion.  Real  Religion  is 
the  encouragement  of  variation.  It  is  forward  reaching. 
It  is  the  doing  away  with  unhelpful  survivals,  and  not  the 
fostering  of  them. 

RELIGION  GROWING  ANEW — OUTSIDE  OF  CHURCH 

The  most  religion,  the  best  religion,  the  truest  religion,  is 
now  outside  the  Church.  (There  may  be  some  numerically 
trifling  exceptions.)  But  this  outside  religion  does  not 
know  itself  as  such.  It  thinks  itself  irreligious,  infidel,  be- 
cause the  definitions  have  been  made  by  the  Church  during 
its  long  opposition  to  advance.  This  unorganized  multitude 
does  not  know  its  power.  It  has  not  come  together.  It  is 
miscellaneous.  It  thinks  of  church  and  religion  in  tradi- 
tional senses — and  will  have  none  of  them.  This  will  not 
always  last.     It  will  study  these  other  facts  also  some  day. 

Many  readers  of  these  pages  are  of  that  body.  Earnest 
thinkers  in  general  are  a  part  of  it.  They  are  largely  out 
of  the  acknowledged  Church.  They  are  often  disowned. 
They  have  left  many  of  the  traditions.  (Not  all.)  They 
are  trying  to  study  facts — as  yet,  mildly  trying — not  vigor- 
ously earnest  about  it.  They  have  not  tried  hard  to  get  to 
the  bottom  facts.  Surely,  it  is  high  time  they  were  looking 
into  this  problem  more  thoroughly. 

THE  CHURCH  COULD  EASILY  REGAIN  ITS  REAL  FUNCTION 

The  Church  ought  to  exist  to  propagate  by  cooperative 
efforts  the  ideals  of  its  indiznduals.  It  ought  to  do  this  by 
various  means.  Many  of  these  means  it  already  has. 
These  methods  and  ideals  are  in  many  other  realms  today. 
Here  is  a  list,  traditional  and  otherwise, 


THE  OUGHT-TO-BE  CHURCH  267 


THE  CHURCH  OUGHT  TO  WORK  BY — 

Sunday  Meetings.  It  does,  but  these  are  mostly  con- 
ducted with  good  music  wasted  by  myths  in  rhyme,  good 
opportunity  lost  by  ancient  readings,  by  senseless  prayers, 
by  harmless  sermons.  And  these  are  its  highest  ideals,  as 
a  whole! 

Sunday  Schools.  Yes,  it  does,  but  with  music  and  lessons 
a  la  church,  mostly  having  reference  to  antiquated  world 
views  and  inefficient  morals. 

Young  People's  Unions.  Again  with  music,  entertain- 
ment, speaking,  socials,  dancing,  and  so  forth,  all  for  the 
enjoyment  of  the  moment — light  weight. 

Woman's  Societies.  Industrious  with  needle-work,  din- 
ner serving,  artificial  sales,  listless  readings,  amateur  papers, 
and  re-editing  respectable  gossip,  while  unserious  and  obli- 
vious to  their  own  deeper  needs,  the  great  world-burning 
problems,  and  the  larger  outlook. 

Philanthropies.  Many  types — the  needy  are  listlessly 
looked  after,  the  sorrowing  and  the  sick  are  superficially 
diverted  by  hired  help  paid  from  the  funds  raised  from 
dramatics,  charity  balls,  and  other  entertainments  in  which 
the  benevolent  (?)  donors  have  "enjoyed"  themselves. 

Reforms.  The  customary  things  are  gently  advocated — 
temperance,  city  government,  school  management,  public 
improvements — but  never  heartily  espoused,  and  mostly 
when  the  periodic  excitements  are  on. 

Music.  For  church  and  for  other  interests— choirs, 
choruses,  orchestras,  and  certain  specialties,  all  for  the 
passing  hour  of  the  individuals,  rehearsing  thought  mostly 
antiquated. 

Missions.  Local  and  foreign,  most  laudable  fancies,  but 
undertaken  in  the  way  that  eternally  considers  the  subject 
as  "heathen"  and  fosters  the  bigoted  "better-than-thou" 
spirit. 

Study  and  Culture  Groups.  These  are  very  nnmcrous 
and  are  the  very  best  feature  of  present  church  work. 
They  include  many  types  of  knowledge  and  culture,  and  arc 


268     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CTVTIJZATION 

often  supplemental  to  deficient  education.  Sometimes  they 
are  even  advanced,  pioneering  into  new  fields.  For  example, 
the  n^odern  Child  Study  movement  and  the  extension  of  the 
Kindergarten  arose  chiefly  through  a  few  liberal  church 
laborers. 

This  division  includes  the  effort  to  get  acquainted  with 
the  "New  Bible"— from  its  "Genesis"  to  its  "Revelation"— 
and  it  is  all  revelation.     It  covers  the  customary — 

1.  Literary  Classes  or  Clubs,  studying  Chaucer,  Shakes- 
peare, Browning,  Emerson,  etc.,  but  almost  never  awake  to 
the  hundred-fold  greater  importance  of  studying  those  near- 
er in  time  who  treat  present  day  ideals  and  problems — 
Ibsen,  Maeterlinck,  Shaw,  Wells,  France,  etc. 

2.  The  History  of  Religion.  Good  for  comparison, 
often  a  starter  in  breaking  into  bigoted  minds,  but  at  most 
only  a  comparison  of  traditional  dogmatisms,  and  merely 
the  mildest  form  of  starting  and  stimulating  growth.  It 
exists  in  an  infantile  stage  in  a  few  of  the  theological  "train- 
ing" schools. 

3.  Philosophy.  Especially  in  the  form  of  an  attenuated 
my_stery-seeking  Psychology.  Occasionally  we  hear  of  some 
half-fledged  child  study  or  some  "new  thought"  (or  non- 
thought)  metaphysics. 

4.  Popular  Science.  The  best,  but  the  rarest  of  this 
line.  Descriptive  Astronomy;  Evolutional  Geology;  Biolo- 
gy enough  to  learn  the  a-b-c  of  the  great  molding  forces  of 
life;  Anthropology  sufficient  to  start  the  realization  of  man's 
great  antiquity,  his  savage  beginnings,  his  varied  races,  and 
his  slow  but  wonderful  progress;  Hygiene,  the  arrival  of 
evolving  man  at  a  stage  of  conscious,  purposive  care  of 
himself  and  his  kin,  in  health  and  in  illness,  by  proper  food, 
proper  uses  of  air,  water,  temperatures,  and  exercise; 
Domestic  Science  (most  advanced  of  all  the  crying  needs)  • 
and  Eugenics  (Family-ology)  (most  vital  of  all,  but  not 
even  begun) — husband  culture,  wife  culture,  fatherhood, 
motherhood,  sex  knowledge,  sex  hygiene,  family  ethics,  and 


f 


THE  OUGHT-TO-BE  CHURCH  269 

the  extension  of  home  virtues  into  civic  and  finally  into 
human  virtues. 

Nothing  less  than  the  most  active  and  enthusiastic  propa- 
gation and  practical  carying  out  of  these  and  other  lines  of 
fundamental  human  interests  can  justify  the  Church.  Then 
will  the  Ought-to-be  Church  supplant  the  present  pretense. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

THE  NEW  MINISTRY  MUST  DEVELOP 
NEW  METHODS 

Is  there  something  the  matter  with  "The  Ministry"  also? 
Are  not  only  its  doctrines,  but  many  of  its  methods  inefficient 
survivals? 

The  unchurched  class  is  rapidly  growing.  Who  is  to 
blame — the  Church  or  the  multitude  that  is  staying  out 
of  it? 

The  school,  the  newspaper,  the  magazine,  the  lecture, 
the  theatre  are  taking  the  place  of  the  Church  intellectually 
for  thousands  of  people. 

Thousands  more  get  their  fellowship  in  society  functions, 
the  lodge,  the  club,  and  the  public  house. 

Other  thousands  get  their  gospel  of  hope  in  the  labor 
unions  and  the  social  movement. 

Now,  in  the  face  of  all  this,  the  Church  as  a  whole  goes 
on  preaching  its  patchwork  of  traditions  in  its  traditional 
manner  It  dwells  almost  wholly  upon  its  old-time  themes, 
modifying  them,  only  as  much  as  it  must.  No  other  busi- 
ness or  enterprise  does  this.  Other  institutions  are  striving 
to  fit  their  age  in  fact  and  method. 

The  world,  by  letting  the  Church  so  much  alone,  shows 
its  declining  interest  in  those  abstract  and  traditional  reitera- 
tions. The  hierarchy  keeps  holding  aloft  the  authority  of 
"The  Book"  and  "the  inner  spiritual  light."  It  holds  out 
the  inducements  of  Heaven  and  (though  increasingly  less) 
the  threats  of  Hell.     And  the  world  looks  on  indififerently ! 

270 


NEW  MINISTRY— DEVELOP  NEW  METHODS    271 

THE  APPARENT  EXCEPTIONS 

Unitarians  and  some  others  are,  theoretically,  beyond  this. 
They  hold  that  religion  is  life;  that  it  includes  all  life — past 
and  present,  higher  and  lower,  Christian  and  Pagan.  But 
in  their  preaching  it  includes  only  a  small  part  of  life. 

Life  today  is  rather  large.  And  if  religion  covers  human 
life,  then  religion  is  a  large  subject. 

Really  then,  isn't  it  rather  too  big  for  any  one  individual 
to  handle  well?  Wouldn't  the  average  preacher  be  pretty 
thin  by  the  time  he  had  spread  himself  all  over  the  field? 
Does  any  one  minister  know  enough  or  can  he  know  enough 
to  properly  cover  more  than  a  limited  part  of  life? 

COLLEGIATE  PREACHING  COMING 

This  suggests  the  prospect  of  Collegiate  Preaching  in  the 
near  future.  Every  church  needs  more  than  one  minister. 
But  since  it  can  hear  but  one  at  a  time,  the  others  can  be 
preaching  at  other  places.  Hence  several  churches  could 
co-operatively  have  several  ministers.  Each  could  preach 
within  his  own  specialty. 

CHURCHES  NON-ASSIMILATIVE 

Combination  is  the  order  of  the  day.  The  Church  is  the 
last  institution  to  work  in  the  spirit  of  union.  Its  holy 
assumptions  stand  in  its  way.  Perhaps  these  are  incurable. 
Perhaps  each  Church  will  insist  on  its  "Special  Divine 
Origin"  till  it  becomes  extinct ! 

In  nearly  every  city,  we  have  now  one  system  of  water 
works  and  ten  to  twenty  systems  of  spiritual  works. 

In  nearly  every  city  we  have  now  one  gas  plant  and  one 
electric  plant  (owned  by  the  same  company  or  better  by 
the  city).  But  we  have  ten,  twenty  or  more  companies 
running  Sunday  Schools  (someone  says  as  "fire  escapes"). 

In  every  city,  we  have  erne  high  school  and  four  or  five 
or  a  dozen  branch  schools,  all  under  the  one  school  board; 


272    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

and  if  we  have  twenty  churches  they  are  under  twent}' 
boards. 

In  the  schools  of  all  cities  (with  the  exception  of  the 
reactionary  parochials),  we  have  practically  all  the  children 
included.  In  the  score  or  more  of  churches  and  Sunday- 
schools  together,  we  probably  have  not  to  exceed  one-fifth 
of  the  total  population  of  these  cities. 

In  some  parts  of  the  country  there  is  a  little  red  school- 
house  every  three  miles  with  a  handful  of  pupils  and  a  very 
poor  teacher.  In  other  parts  there  is  a  central  township 
school  with  all  the  children  of  the  township  daily  brought 
in  automobiles  and  spending  their  time  with  relatively  ex- 
cellent teachers.  Almost  everywhere  the  Church  is  in  the- 
little-red-schoolhouse  condition. 

CHURCH  PROCLAIMS  MANY  KINDS  OF  TRUTH 
SCIENCE  PROCLAIMS  BUT  ONE  KIND 

The  "Church"  professes  to  be  the  institution  par  excel- 
lence for  proclaiming  truth.  The  so-called  "Church"  has 
not  less  than  170  kinds  of  truth  about  God,  the  World,  Man, 
and  Man's  relation  to  God.  Science  has  hut  one  kind  of  truth 
about  the  stars,  about  numbers,  about  matter,  and  so  forth. 
All  the  schools  of  Science  teach  that  the  earth  is  a  sphere, 
and  so  on  for  the  other  ten  thousand  facts  and  truths. 

With  great  ostentation  these  170  odd  kinds  of  preachers 
talk  much  about  preaching  "Truth"  and  about  the  "Word  of 
God."  It  is  questioned  by  those  outside  the  Church  whether 
they  have  any  really  established  truth.  The  Church  as  a 
whole  is  almost  a  stranger  to  the  methods  of  real  truth- 
getting.  The  Church  as  a  whole  is  so  hypnotized  by  the 
old  doctrines  and  so  habituated  to  its  old  ways,  that  it  fails 
to  see  the  meaning  of  Science  and  the  trend  of  the  times. 

LIBERAL  CHURCHES  STILL  IN  STATE  OF  OLD  METHODS 

The  Unitarian  Church  and  some  exceptional  individual 
churches  have  passed  beyond  much  of  the  out-aged  "Truth." 
These  have  got  hold  of  much  of  the  newer,  truer  truth. 


NEW  MINISTRY— DEVELOP  NEW  METHODS    273 

And  what  is  said  of  them  applies  also  of  other  religious 
bodies  that  have  begun  the  break  with  the  traditional  doc- 
trines and  methods.  But  to  the  most  of  mankind  the  state- 
ments of  these  liberals  seem  etherial,  far-off,  impractical, 
and  their  methods  appear  too  much  like  the  others. 

The  "Uberals"  have  not  found  out  how  to  change  this. 
They  are  not  students  of  biological  psychology  and  its  new 
pedagogy.  As  a  body,  they  have  yet  to  discover  that  new 
ideas  are  not  learned  from  statement;  that  there  must  be 
investigation  and  experience,  that  experience  must  be  con- 
crete. The  new  idea  about  God  comes  by  dealing  with  the 
new  facts ;  not  by  hearing  that  some  one  else  has  seen  them. 
The  new  understanding  of  the  Old  Bible  comes  by  seeing 
and  studying  the  New  Bible.  Preaching  on  Biblical  Criti- 
cism must  be  backed  by  the  concrete  facts  in  the  hands  of 
the  people  or  before  their  eyes.  People  can  only  believe  that 
there  are  good  things  in  other  religions  when  they  see  these 
things  in  unmistakable  print  or  in  the  people  who  profess 
those  religions.  The  statement  that  other  religions  are  ex- 
cellent in  many  ways  carries  no  weight  to  most  minds. 

Because  of  inexperience  in  the  pedagogical  side  of  their 
work,  most  "liberals"  in  churches  seem  to  suppose  that 
twenty  or  thirty  minutes  of  explanation  once  a  week, 
addressed  to  the  unthinking  and  little-reading  world  will  in 
a  few  years  turn  the  thoughts  and  habits  of  the  ages  aside 
and  make  their  denomination  what  the  Catholic  church  once 
was !  How  little  they  study  the  reports  in  their  own  Year 
Books !  Our  non-realization  of  the  fact  that  it  took  each 
of  us  five  or  ten  years  (or  a  lifetime)  to  grasp  what  little  we 
know  in  these  lines  is  astonishing!  We  think  we  are  evo- 
lutionists— we  say  we  are;  and  yet — 

NEW  METHODS  NECESSITATED  BY  NEW  THOUGHT 

Now  as  to  forms  and  methods  all  "liberal"  churches  yield 
to  and  mostly  follow  the  traditions  of  the  orthodox  Church 
as  to  the  ways  of  inculcating  religious  thoughts  and  inspira- 
tion.    It  took  them  a  long  while  to  cease  negating,  to  realize 


274    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

that  with  more  Hberal  thou{?hts  should  go  more  liberal 
conduct,  that  with  civilized  conceptions  should  jj^o  a  civilized 
manner.  'I'hese  they  have  very  nearly  learned.  They  know 
lunv  to  state  their  new  doctrine  without  denying  the  old. 

Bui  they  have  invented  little  of  improved  method  for 
bringing  about  new  religious  conceptions. 

Astronomy  never  was  developed  by  the  methods  of 
Astrology. 

Alchemy  changed  its  ways  Ijefore  it  became  Chemistry. 

Catholicism  and  Protestantism  have  yet  to  change  their 
ways.     When  they  do,  great  things  will  result. 

"Liberal"  Churches  have  mostly  given  up  the  "Book,"  the 
written  "Creed,"  the  "Communion,"  "Baptism,"  etc.  They 
do  it  without  denying  these.  They  let  them  alone  as  irrele- 
vant. They  yet  have  the  "Service,"  the  "Sermon," 
"Prayers,"  "Petitions,"  the  "Sacred  Hours  of  Worship,"  the 
"Benediction,"  etc.  These  are  not  so  wholly  inexcusable, 
because  a  practically  new  content  has  been  added,  yet  this 
is  probably  three-fourths  untrue.  And  these  people  are  as 
quick  to  object  as  the  more  thoroughgoing  traditionalists 
when  any  one  suggests  further  change,  especially  in  form. 
Possibly  it  is  a  mistake  to  suggest  a  change.  Perhaps  the 
best  way  would  be  simply  to  change. 

UNLESS  FORMS  CHANGE,  DECAY  FOLLOWS 

Human  History  shows  that  nothing  but  certainty  of  total 
defeat  will  ordinarily  drive  people  to  drop  their  old  prac- 
tices. Surely  the  Liberal  Church  will  not  insist  on  retaining 
the  terms  "Unitarian,"  "Universalist,"  "Church,"  "Prayer," 
"Petition;"  on  clinging  to  Sunday  morning  "Services"  and 
thirty  minute  "Sermons"  and  "Solemn  Postures"  and  ab- 
stract statements,  in  face  of  the  fact  that  the  larger  part  of 
the  population  is  tired  of  and  done  with  these  things!  Is 
the  gratification  of  one's  belief  and  habit  to  stand  in  the 
way  of  his  usefulness?  Are  we  to  insist  on  our  forms, 
when  people  show  by  their  absence  that  these  forms  are  of 
no  use  to  them  ?     Liberal  causes  get  few  recruits  from  other 


NEW  MINISTRY— DEVELOP  NEW  METHODS     275 

churches.  They  get  those  who  are  out  of  churches — (when 
they  get  any).  Workers  for  advanced  views  get  tlieir 
recruits  by  addressing  those  who  are  out.  These  are  more 
Hkely  to  be  the  susceptibles.  They  are  out  because  they  do 
not  want  to  be  in ;  because  they  are  done  with  most  oi  the 
Church  doctrines  and  practices. 

VAGUE  BASIS  IN  LIBERAL  ORGANIZATIONS 

The  average  liberal  audience  of  any  type  is  composed  of 
individuals  who  are  variations  from  the  supposed  religious 
standard.  All  they  have  in  common  at  first  is  the  self- 
centered  yearning  for  freedom  and  the  vague  notion  of 
progress  in  religious  things.  Necessarily,  then,  they  do  not 
coalesce  readily  in  strong  substantial  organizations.  Aside 
from  the  idea  of  freedom,  they  have  nothing  in  their  con- 
sciousness to  organize  for.  There  is  no  concensus  on  an\- 
I)Ositive  or  affirmative  ideas.  Hence  the  ever  prevalent 
lack  of  strong  attachment  in  so-called  lil)eral  organizations. 

DEEPER   BOND  IX    UNIVERSAL   IDEAS 

Now  to  get  these  variations  into  some  concensus  of  views, 
into  some  common  agreement  about  life  and  the  great  source 
and  support  of  life — this  is  the  problem.  But  first,  you  must 
ccjllect  your  variations.  This  you  can  not  do  by  your  own 
individual  more  highly  evolved  conceptions.  Of  these  they 
know  little  or  nothing.  You  must  collect  them  by  emj)liasis 
on  those  universal  ideas  and  ideals  which  they  and  you  and 
those  they  have  varied  from,  all  possess  in  common.  These 
form  a  bond.  Their  e.\[>osition  is  a  comfort.  It  creates  a 
sympathy.     This  is  the  beginning  of  organic  helpfulness. 

Next  must  follow  education.  Though  they  know  many 
of  these  they  must  be  taught  more  definitely  and  systemati- 
cally the  facts  of  life  and  its  conditions.  The  source  for 
this  is  in  Science.  Tt  need  not  and  can  not  be  done  in 
university  fashion.  It  must  be  done  through  the  portrayal 
of  phases  of  life.  It  could  be  rapidly  done  by  the  puli)it, 
books,  and  journals. 


276    A   RECEIVERSHIP   FOR   CIVILIZATION 


A  LITTLE  EXPERIMENT  IN  FORMS 

To  partly  practice  what  I  am  preaching,  I  will  state  one 
little  concrete  experience.  For  two  years  and  a  half,  in  a 
former  ministerial  effort,  I  put  all  possible  unction  and  much 
variation  of  thought  into  the  customary  forms  for  getting 
people  interested  in  the  liberal  church  cause.  We  changed 
the  name  to  All  Souls'  Church,  we  did  the  usual  things,  and 
we  hired  the  best  singing  we  could  afford.  But  the  cause 
merely  held  its  own.  A  few  churches  are  doing  this, 
avowedly  the  Unitarian  and  Universalist  denominations. 
But  they  are  not  keeping  pace  with  the  United  States 
Census ! 

In  the  great  universities  I  studied  the  new  methods  of 
teaching.  When  I  came  to  the  Church,  I  was  told  that  "the 
pulpit  was  no  place  for  teaching!"  Booker  Washington 
forcefully  illustrated  this  hair-splitting.  An  old  colored 
woman  strayed  into  an  Episcopal  church.  She  heard  some 
familiar  phrases.  They  stirred  her  emotions  of  approval. 
She  shouted  out,  "Glory  to  God!"  One  of  the  wardens 
immediately  waited  upon  her  and  told  her  she  must  keep 
quiet.  "But  Fse  done  got  religion,"  she  replied.  "Yes,  but 
don't  you  know  this  is  no  place  to  get  religion?"  whispered 
the  embarrassed  man. 

Though  two  theological  schools,  one  orthodox  and  one 
liberal,  told  me  the  pulpit  was  no  place  for  teaching,  I  never 
believed  it.  Somehow  I  thought  the  teachers  needed  a  little 
more  of  the  preacher's  fervor,  and  the  preachers  a  good  deal 
more  of  the  teacher's  truth.  Still  I  tried  to  obey  the  spirit 
of  the  Church  authority.  I  had  for  years  seen  and  prac- 
ticed as  a  teacher  the  more  objective  method.  I  had  proved 
it  true  by  experiment  in  the  school  room.  "Of  course,  you 
are  to  preach  the  truth  in  the  pulpit.  But  then  religious 
truth  is  different!  You  do  not  teach  it.  You  preach  it. 
You  are  to  proclaim  it  as  the  gospel." 

At  another  time  they  tell  you,  we  have  a  "new  gospel" — 
which  means  that  the  people  do  not  know  it,  else  if  they  did, 
the  liberaUzing  work  would  be  superfluous.     Is  it  not  rather 


NEW  MINISTRY— DEVELOP  NEW  METHODS    277 

refined  to  say  you  shall  preach  something  they  do  not  know, 
but  you  must  not  teach  it? 

It  was  about  Christmas  time  when  the  break  came.  I 
could  not  longer  stand  it.  I  sent  for  fifty  views  on  the  home 
of  Santa  Claus,  hired  the  electric  company  to  put  in  the 
current,  and  then  set  up  my  stereopticon  in  the  Sunday 
School  room.  The  announcement  was  made.  Twice  the 
number  of  children  came !  We  moved  the  apparatus  up- 
stairs and  kept  it  blazing  Sunday  evenings  for  five  months. 
The  audience  averaged  more  than  one  hundred  and  fifty. 
In  the  morning  it  averaged  sixty.  One  was  to  hear  "lec- 
tures" and  the  other  "sermons."  It  was  the  same  speaker 
saying  things  in  the  same  spirit  each  time.  As  they  say  in 
Algebra,  I  changed  the  form  without  altering  the  value: 
3a  equals  la  plus  2a.     It  is  still  3a. 

The  next  year  I  fell  still  farther  from  the  grace  of  the 
"sacred  service."  When  the  cold  weather  (or  something 
else)  kept  twenty  of  the  sixty  people  at  home  in  the  morning, 
we  simply  said,  very  well,  we'll  have  the  meeting  in  the 
still  colder  evening  and  use  the  lantern  for  three  months 
or  so.  And  instead  of  forty  there  came  two  hundred  to 
three  hundred.  Fifty  of  them  were  children.  The  subjects 
were  worded,  Japan,  Russia,  Berlin,  Paris,  Greenland,  and 
many  titles  from  history  and  science,  all  with  moral  and 
social  sub-topic  attachments.  But  the  substance  of  it  was 
Evolution,  God,  Human  Brotherhood,  Progress,  and  indi- 
vidual Growth. 

Was  it  wicked?     "It  was  bad  form." 

EVOLUTION  IN  FORMS 

The  way  to  mind  is  through  the  senses.  Worship  had  its 
beginning  in  an  appeal  to  the  eye  by  sacrifices.  When  the 
"Iwiw  and  Prophets"  had  evolved,  the  Sacrifice  was  accom- 
panied by  the  "Reading  of  the  La^v"  to  the  ear.  loiter,  tlie 
Law  was  expounded  and  around  tlie  Altar  the  people  were 
seated.  By  and  by  came  the  .Sermon  and  less  Law,  and  no 
Sacrifice.     This  was  fortifierl  by  i)i!lars,  mosaics,   frescoed 


278    A   RECEIVERSHir    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

walls,  and  colored  windows.  Then  came  Music  another 
type  of  auditory  appeal  interspersed  between  readings, 
prayers,  recitals,  chants,  sermons.  Forms  and  environment 
were  all  made  to  fit  the  doctrine. 

Now  the  doctrine  has  decayed.  The  old  forms  are 
already  obsolete  to  two-thirds  of  the  population.  A  new 
doctrine  is  growing.  A  new  form  and  environment  is 
evolving  to  be  its  vehicle.  It  will  be  baffling  for  a  time. 
Such  junctures  always  are.     But  it  is  near  at  hand. 

Our  experience  was  but  one  of  the  many  possible  things. 
Suppers,  dinners,  refreshments,  afternoon  teas,  socials, 
choirs,  organs,  pianos,  musicals,  dramatics,  games,  dances, 
sczving  circles,  fairs,  rummage  sales,  excursions,  receptions, 
gymnastics,  cooking  classes,  kindergartens,  manual  training, 
Browning  and  Emerson  clubs,  reading  circles,  reading  rooms, 
illustrated  lectures,  moving  pictures,  mothers'  meetings, 
sewing  schools,  social  settlements,  and  a  few  other  innova- 
tions are  taking  on  religious  atmosphere. 

These  and  more,  one  and  all,  are  already  here, — new 
methods  and  forms  of  creating  and  maintaining  interest  in 
religious  things.  But  they  are  not  enough.  The  preaching 
is  still  old-fashioned.  To  put  it  in  a  word — it  will  have  to 
become  objective.  The  age  of  listening  to  theories  is  well 
past.  Physics  and  Psychology  are  taught  by  illustration. 
Morals  and  Theology  will  fall  into  line.  "We  es'say  too 
much  and  essay'  too  little." 

I  can  think  of  difficulties  that  may  possibly  arise  in  some 
minds  regarding  this  suggestion.  T  had  them  myself  awhile 
ago.  They  will  vanish  when  thorough  effort  begins.  Every 
truth  is  a  "God's  truth,"  a  .statement  of  the  nature  of  things. 
Every  subject  or  fact  has  truth  in  it.  All  truth  is  inspiring 
and  tends  to  goodness.  The  harmony  of  truth  is  beauty. 
These  are  all  religious,  and  the  sphere  of  religion  covers 
them  all.  A  generous,  knowledge  of  history,  science,  art, 
and  society  will  furnish  the  background;  and  tact  and  in- 


NEW  MINISTRY— DEVELOP  NEW  METHODS     279 

genuity  will  supply  the  means  of  handling  objects,  pictures, 
charts,  and  other  concrete  illustrations  in  preaching.  Such 
appealing  will  get  very  close  to  life.  To  make  life  religious, 
to  make  people  serious,  to  bring  the  realization  of  Immanent 
Divine  Law  into  human  consciousness,  I  conceive  to  be  the 
great  end  of  religious  effort. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 
COLLEGIATE  PREACHING 

MINISTERS  SHOULD  SPECIALIZE.  THEIR  ONE 
HOPE  OF  REINSTATEMENT  TO  FAVOR.  THEY 
TALK  ON  TOO  MANY  SUBJECTS  AND  ARE  SEL- 
DOM SPECIALISTS  IN  ANY. 

SOME  INCREASING   FACTS 

The  churches  in  general  are  not  keeping  pace  with  the  age 
in  fact  and  doctrine. 

The  churches  are  not  keeping  pace  with  the  population  in 
membership. 

The  churches  are  not  keeping  up  with  the  age  in  respect. 

The  churches  are  not  in  step  with  the  age  in  methods  and 
means. 

SOME  CHANGES  IN  METHOD 

Everywhere  the  age  has  tended  to  specialism. 

To  command  attention  or  to  be  in  demand  today  every 
one  must  do  something  well. 

Ministers  "scatter",  or  essay  too  many  themes,  and  as 
things  are  they  can  scarcely  avoid  this,  nor  do  their  work 
up  to  standard. 

The  field  of  the  really  religious  and  moral  things  is  too 
large  now  for  any  man's  mastery. 

Under  present  methods  and  customs,  the  ministers  must 
assume  to  cover  this  field,  and,  hence,  their  views  are 
assumed  to  be  superficial. 

It  has  come  about  that  religion  and  ethics  are  full  of 
uncertainties  and  mooted  questions. 

280 


COLLEGIATE  PREACHING  281 

Every  minister  preaches  from  fifty  to  one  hundred  times 
a  year,  and  on  many  topics  upon  which  he  has  read  only  as 
other  people  read.     He  has  really  studied  very  few  of  them. 

WHICH  WAY  IS  THE  REMEDY? 

If  ministers  could  treat,  say  eight  to  a  dozen  themes  a 
year,  instead  of  fifty  to  one  hundred,  and  could  give  all  their 
time  and  energy'  to  these  limited  themes,  they  would  be 
pursuing  the  method  of  the  age. 

Thus  each  could  work  on  his  specialty,  his  forte,  the  field 
in  which  he  is  more  gifted. 

Thus  each  could  hope  to  know,  as  men  of  science  know. 

Thus  (like  college  men  and  other  investigators)  they 
could,  as  a  profession,  soon  become  discoverers  of  truth  and 
the  practical  appliers  of  it  to  life. 

Thus,  each  preacher  could  shortly  become  "a  specialist" 
("an  authority")   on  some  line. 

Thus,  each  would  be  sure  of  a  much  better  hearing, 
because  this  is  the  way  of  the  age,  this  is  the  expected 
practice. 

Thus,  his  utterances  might  again  finally  have  the  ring  of 
confidence  and  almost  command  the  deference  that 
announcements  from  scientific  research  command. 

Thus,  these  utterances  could,  in  a  few  years,  become  a 
body  of  truth  based  on  profound  research. 

WHAT  IS  THIS  RELIEF? 

Such  a  condition  has  in  some  measure  arrived  in  that 
circle  of  churches  which  has  reached  the  broader  outlook. 

Some  remedy  is,  for  them  more  urgent,  more  practical 
and  more  possible. 

A  FIRST  REMEDY  LIES  IN  "COLLEGIATE  PREACHING" 

"Collegiate  Preaching"  will  provide  the  opix)rtunity  for 
specializing  among  the  ministers,  and,  at  the  same  time,  do 
for  the  churches  wiiat  "University  I'-xtcnsion"  docs  for  the 


js_>   a  receivership  for  civilization 

people  outside  the  university  circles — only  it   could  do   it 
better. 

Since  there  should  be  meetings  in  every  church  every 
Sunday ;  since  every  minister  during  the  year  preaches  on 
five  times  too  many  themes ;  hence,  to  treat  only  a  legitimate 
number,  he  must  arrange  with  several,  say  four  other 
ministers  for  mutual  relief,  mutual  opportunity,  and  help. 

Therefore,  let  each  remain  the  minister  of  the  church 
where  he  now  is  settled,  and  let  him  continue  to  perform 
its  usual  clerical  and  pastoral  duties — for  the  present. 

Let  each  (months  beforehand)  work  out,  say,  four 
themes,  and  at  the  beginning  of  the  church  year  expound 
them  to  his  resident  church  during  four  Sundays,  in 
stronger,  better  sermons. 

Let  each  then  go  for  four  weeks  to  one  of  the  other  four 
churches  in  the  combine  and  expound  the  same  four  themes 
— studying  them  deeper,  doing  the  work  better,  and  thinking, 
reading,  and  investigating  for  coming  series. 

Let  each  continue  to  speak  his  special  phase  of  truth  and 
gospel,  his  best  and  profoundest  message  to  each  of  the  five 
churches. 

Half  of  the  church  year  has  thus  been  filled  and  during  it 
(and  also  long  before)  each  minister  has  been  thinking, 
investigating,  reading  about,  and  planning  his  next  four 
themes.  Each  of  the  five  then  proceeds  to  preach  the 
second  round  in  a  similar  way. 

THE  RESULTS  TO  THE  MINISTERS 

Each   minister  has   had   what   he   never   had   before a 

chance  to  approach  his  best. 

Each  minister  has  grown  deep  in  the  line  of  his  greatest 
ability  and  power. 

Each  minister  has  grown  fertile  and  ingenious  in  methods 
of  making  clear  and  interesting  the  themes  he  handles. 

Each  minister  has  grown  in  confidence,  and,  therefore,  in 
capacity  for  inspiring  others. 

Each  minister  has  seen  four  new  congregations  and  fields 


COLLEGIATE  PREACHING  283 

has  experienced  the  enlarging  influence  of  new  circum- 
stances, and  has  applied  new  experience  to  the  broadening 
and  testing  of  his  messages. 

Each  minister  is  thus  becoming  an  investigator,  and  is 
learning  at  first  hand  the  highest  and  truest  road  to  those 
Divine  things  which  before  he  admired  and  proclaimed 
mostly  from  hearsay. 

THE  RESULT  TO  THE  CHURCHES 

Each  church  has  heard  of  the  higher  things  from  several 
personalities. 

Each  church  has  had  the  very  rare  benefit  of  hearing  a 
specialist  every  Sunday  on  a  variety  of  phases  of  the  great 
field  of  life. 

Each  church  may  thus  experience  an  advantage  several 
times  greater  than  it  could  from  the  prevailing  custom  of 
hearing  the  stale  exhortations  of  limited  minds. 

Each  church  and  neighborhood  will  in  time,  come  to  re- 
gard the  Sunday  meeting  as  a  great  opportunity,  just  as 
people  look  forward  to  the  coming  of  any  public  speaker 
who  is  supposed  to  know  his  field  (as  far  as  knowledge  has 
penetrated.) 

THE  RESULT  TO  THE  CHURCH  IN  GENERAL 

The  Church  in  general  will  thus  begin  to  redeem  its  lost 
prestige  and  will  approach  again  the  front  rank  of  human 
respect. 

It  can  take  up  actual  problems  of  present  life  and  interest. 
It  can  speak  out  on  matters  of  civic  life  and  social  well- 
being..  It  can  espouse  the  cause  of  justice  and  raise  its 
voice  for  the  down-trodden.     It  can  again  have  a  gospel. 

The  Church  could  thus  open  the  way  for  the  gradual  over- 
hauling, reinvestigating  and  rectifying  of  its  dfjctrines  and 
the  justifying  of  its  place  as  a  .social  institution  in  the  minds 
of  that  large  thinking  rlass,  who  arc  nf)w  in  doubt  abf)ut  it. 

The  power  of  the  Church  cverj'whcrc  would  thus  increase, 


284     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

its  influence  would  grow  irresistible  within  its  realm,  it 
would  become  an  authority  in  that  realm,  and  the  every-day 
reading  world  would  soon  cease  to  regard  it  with  indiffer- 
ence or  sneers. 

EASY  AND  PRACTICABLE 

Collegiate  Preaching  is  far  easier  of  accomplishment  than 
University  Extension.     It  is  made  practicable  today — 

By  the  relatively  short  distances  between  churches. 

By  the  cheap  and  quick  modes  of  travel. 

By  the  easy  communications  with  the  home  pastorate. 

By  the  abundance  of  books. 

By  the  great  advantage  everywhere  for  nature  study  and 
every  sort  of  investigation. 

By  the  wondrous  and  helpful  trend  of  general  public 
opinion  toward  unifying  enterprises  and  combining  forces 
in  business  and  philanthropy. 

By  the  essential  helpfulness  of  the  method  itself  in  culti- 
vating breadth  of  appreciation  and  sympathy. 

By  the  incurable  tendency  of  the  people  to  be  expectant 
of  new  things  and  strong  influences,  and  to  tire  of  the  reg- 
ular, the  unchangeable,  the  old-fashioned. 

This  latter  may  be  ever  so  regrettable,  but  it  is  an 
irremediable  fact.  Besides  in  no  other  profession  is  it  so 
strongly  felt  as  in  the  ministry.  The  teacher,  professor, 
lawyer,  physician  change  audiences  every  year  or  oftener, 
while  their  audiences  are  at  the  same  time  compelled.  In 
religion  there  is  more  liberty  regarding  adherence  than  in 
any  other  field.  Everyone  must  go  to  school,  must  have  a 
physician — but  he  doesn't  have  to  go  to  church. 

There  are  just  a  few  symptoms  that  enough  of  church 
leaders  will  see  the  situation  to  save  the  wreck  of  the 
institution.  A  dozen  years  ago  I  had  large  hopes.  The 
decay  has  gone  on  more  rapidly  of  late.  The  Social  Re- 
formers, Socialists,  and  so  forth,  are  going  after  the  job  of 
human  betterment  in  a  more  or  less  pretendedh-  scientific 
manner.     It   has   become   a  gospel   to   hundreds   of   them. 


COLLEGIATE  PREACHING  285 

They  are  organizing.  Does  it  mean  tlie  equivalent  of  what 
a  renovated,  rejuvenated  church  would  be? 

The  Church  as  a  whole  is  yet  not  only  a  bulwark  of 
certain  features  in  a  social  system  that  has  now  become  the 
great  iniquity,  but  most  of  the  Church  is  yet  an  advocate 
of  ancient  religious  theory. 

Openly  against  these  is  the  Scientific  Evolutionary  trend 
ivhich  revolutionizes  religious  theory  by  providing  a  new 
world  outlook  and  a  new  world  power,  and  the  Social 
Justice  trend  which  arises  from  the  new  views  of  life  and 
man  and  the  industrial  and  economic  awakening  of  the 
working  world. 

Together,  these  will  destroy  all  views  and  all  institutions 
of  the  past  which  do  not  re-form  themselves  to  the  new  facts 
and  the  juster  morals  and  social  life. 

Will  the  Church  adopt  the  means  to  fit  itself  to  the  zvorld 
it  is  in  now?  Or  will  it  go  the  way  of  other  religions  when 
analagous  conditions  came? 

We  shall  knozv  within  another  generation. 

NOTE — The  main  points  of  this  chapter  were  first  given  as 
a  sermon  in  All  Soul's  Church,  Iowa  City,  la.,  Jan.  4,  1903.  An 
outline  was  published  in  the  "Iowa  City  Republican."  The  ser- 
mon was  afterwards  delivered  in  Humboldt,  Des  Moines,  Daven- 
port and  Burlington,  la.,  and  in  Fort  Collins  and  Greeley,  Colo. 
The  times  are  more  urgent  now. 


286    A    RECEIVKRSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 


EMINENT  CORROBORATION 

NOTE — This  thought  is  of  such  vital  import  that  I  here  append 
a  considerable  excerpt  on  "Tlie  Collegiate  Church"  from  The 
Christian  Register,  Boston,  June  30,  1910.  It  was  written  by 
Rev.  Samuel  A.  Eliot,  D.  D.,  President  of  the  American  Unitarian 
Association. 

"Has  not  the  time  come  when  we  must  revise  our  ideas  about 
the  duties  and  functions  of  ministers?  Must  not  the  ministi-y 
follow  the  changing  habit  of  every  other  profession?  The 
general  practitioner  in  Medicine  is  gradually  disappearing.  The 
same  is  true  in  Law.  If  I  have  need  of  the  services  of  an 
attorney,  he  usually  refers  me  to  some  comrade  who  can  give 
me  the  special  advice  I  need.  We  used  to  think  of  Engineering 
as  a  profession,  but  now  we  must  speak  of  civil  engineers, 
mining-engineers,  electrical  engineeers,  and  the  like.  We  may 
not  like  this  readjustment,  but  we  are  forced  by  changing  condi- 
tions to  adapt  ourselves  to  it.  I  am  led,  therefore,  to  raise  the 
question  whether  the  time  has  not  come  for  similar  differentia- 
tion and  vocational  training  in  the  ministry. 

"The  original  theory  of  the  Congregational  minister  was  that 
of  a  man  set  apart  for  a  lifelong  settlement  as  the  sole  spiritual 
guide  and  moral  teacher  of  a  single  town  or  parish.  At  first 
the  ministerial  function  was  regarded  as  essentially  connected 
with  such  settlement,  and  a  minister  without  a  parish  had  no 
professional  standing  and  no  legal  rights.  The  theory  that  the 
ministerial  office  could  be  discharged  only  by  those  ministers 
who  were  actually  settled  in  parishes  was  overthrown  by  the 
ministers  themselves,  who  insisted  that  their  ordination  as  min- 
isters was  for  life  and  not  merely  for  the  years  in  which  they 
served  a  particular  parish.  The  lifelong  settlement  gradually 
gave  way  before  the  changing  habits  of  the  people  and  has  now, 
with  rare  exceptions,  totally  disappeared. 

"The  reasons  for  ministerial  restlessness  are  not  hard  to  find. 
One  reason  is,  the  legitimate  desire  for  more  adequate  remun- 
eration. The  pitifully  small  salaries  paid  by  too  many  churches 
require  that  a  self-respecting  minister  with  a  family  dependent 
upon  him  should  be  constantly  on  the  lookout  for  an  opportunity 
to  improve  his  financial  condition.  Another  reason  is  that  many 
churches  have  an  insatiable  and  not  altogether  blameworthy 
desire  for  novelty,  a  change  of  direction  or  of  impulse.  A  third 
reason  is  the  necessarily  inadequate  equipment  of  many  minis- 
ters, a  lack  of  resources  so  that  the  intellectual  and  spiritual 
supplies  run  low.  No  one  of  these  reasons  necessarily  involves 
any  reproach  to  ministers  or  parishes,  but  all  of  them  add  to 
the  indictment  against  our  present  theory  of  the  ministry. 


COLLEGIATE  PREACHING  287 

"The  fact  is  that  the  demands  of  our  age  upon  the  single  min- 
ister of  the  single  parish  have  become  insupportable  save  by 
the  rarest  spirits.  There  are  still  a  few  remarkable  ministers 
who  are  able  to  respond  with  reasonable  efficiency  to  the  modern 
requirements,  and  there  are  a  few  more  whose  special  brilliancy 
in  some  one  department  of  a  minister's  many-chambered  activity 
compounds  for  his  shortcomings  in  other  departments.  But  the 
great  majority  of  ministers  simply  cannot  be  e.xpected  to  mea- 
sure up  to  the  standards  which  compel  success  in  the  work  of 
a  modern  church.  It  is  too  much  to  expect  that  a  man  can  be 
all  at  once  an  intellectual  leader,  well  versed  in  the  learning  of 
the  schools  and  keeping  abreast  of  advancing  knowledge;  a 
faithful  and  industrious  pastor,  quick  to  sympathize  with  all 
the  various  moods  and  caprices  of  the  flock,  ready  to  rejoice  with 
those  who  are  glad  and  to  weep  with  those  who  weep;  an  inter- 
esting and  inspiring  preacher  able  to  lift  his  hearers  to  higher 
levels  of  thought  and  conduct,  to  make  truth  clear  and  duty 
imperative;  an  expert  in  religious  education,  eager  to  guide  the 
children  into  ways  of  right  thinking  and  living;  a  social  leader, 
resourceful,  tactful,  popular,  able  to  be  at  ease  in  any  company 
and  conversant  with  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men;  a  skillful 
administrator,  who  can  raise  money,  promote  the  business  inter- 
ests of  a  parish,  and  oversee  its  temporal  concerns;  an  expert 
in  charitable  work,  co-operating  with  all  the  agencies  that  make 
for  the  welfare  of  the  community;  a  public  spirited  citizen, 
intelligently  active  in  the  promotion  of  civic  reforms  and  well 
informed  about  all  public  discussions  and  obligations.  I  have 
only  begun  to  catalogue  the  duties  of  a  modern  minister,  and  yet 
it  is  enough  to  prove  that  it  is  impossible  to  expect  any  one  man 
to  meet  all  these  requirements.  The  inevitable  failure  and  the 
resulting  friction  embitter  many  a  faithful  minister's  life. 

"What  is  the  remedy?  Is  it  not  to  be  found  in  the  gradual  aban- 
donment of  our  traditional  theories  of  the  ministerial  ofllco  and 
the  adoption  of  a  conception  of  the  ministry  which  will  permit 
of  our  churches  utilizing  the  diversities  of  gifts  and  operations 
for  the  advancement  of  a  common  cause?  Must  we  not 
gradually  take  up  the  idea  that,  on  the  one  hand,  a  single  preach- 
er can  often  serve  two  or  three  churches,  and  one  director  of 
religious  education  serve  an  entire  conference,  or  one  expert 
in  philanthropy  a  whole  group  of  churches,  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  a  single  church  can  and  often  should  avail  itself  of 
the  services  of  a  group  of  ministers  each  esprcially  fitted  by 
temperament  and  training  for  the  efficient  administration  of 
some  particular  branch  of  the  church's  work?  Shall  we  nof 
look  forward  to  the  working  out  of  the  Ideal  of  what  someone 
has  called  'the  Collegiate  Church'? 

"This  change  of  conception  obviously  Involves  a  correHpondlng 


288    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

change  in  our  methods  of  preparation.  Already  several  Divinity 
Schools  are  adapting  their  courses  to  meet  the  new  demand. 

■  Courses  of  study  are  outlined  and  recommended  which  lead 
(1)  to  the  work  of  the  regular  pastorate,  (2)  to  expert  service 
in  the  province  of  religious  education,  (3)  to  employment  in 
the  foreign  field,  (4)  to  work  among  our  fellow-citizens  of  foreign 
birth  and  speech,  (5)  to  social  service  under  Christian  auspices 
and  in  connection  with  institutional  religion.  Must  not  this 
process  of  differentiation  go  on  in  all  the  schools  which  have 
heretofore  carried  on  their  work  with  the  sole  purpose  of  pre- 
paring their  students  for  the  pastoral  and  preaching  functions? 

"I  cannot  but  believe  that  this  change  in  the  conception  of  the 
ministry  and  in  the  training  for  the  ministry  which  such  a 
change  involves,  will  make  the  ministry  more  attractive  to 
strong  men.  It  is  too  often  unattractive  now  because  the  min- 
ister seems  to  be  in  such  a  large  measure  confined  to  the  limited 
round  of  relatively  small  functions.  He  must  do  so  many  things 
that  he  has  not  time  to  do  any  one  of  them  thoroughly.  Should 
he  not  be  made  to  understand  that  henceforth  he  is  to  be  trained 
as  an  expert  in  some  particular  field,  that  he  is  to  employ  his 
special  aptitude  in  the  ways  where  it  can  be  most  efficient,  that 
he  is  to  serve  a  whole  fellowship,  a  whole  community,  along  the 
lines  in  which  he  can  be  most  useful?  That  is  an  inspiring 
challenge,  and  its  acceptance  will  mean  the  upbuilding  of  an 
efficient  and  happy  ministry  and  of  our  churches  through  that 
ministry." 


PART  SEVEN 

RELIGIOUS    RECONSTRUCTION 
URGENT 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

SCIENTIFIC  DOCTRINE  AND  METHOD 
IMPERATIVE   NOW 

If  we  today  have  not  reason  for  anxious,  enthusiastic, 
vigorous  efforts  in  trying  to  wake  up  those  within  reach 
to  the  realization  of  rehgious  and  social  conditions  and  the 
incalculable  consequences  threatening,  then  never  was  there 
cause.  Alfred  Noyes  in  The  Saturday  Evening  Post  re- 
cently had  an  alamiing  article  entitled  "CizAlisation  Imper- 
iled." To  him  the  peril  is  that  the  world  is  letting  loose 
from  the  old  views  of  God  and  Man  and  Bible.  True,  it 
surely  is  imperiled.  But  this  is  not  peril.  It  is  part  of  the 
relief.  Is  not  1900  years  about  long  enough  to  try  out  a 
theory?  All  the  world  is  alarmed  except  the  more  literal 
church  contingent,  and  some  of  these  (like  children)  are 
more  or  less  scared  because  others  are — they  do  not  know 
why.  Anarchists  and  monarchists,  socialists  and  capitalists, 
rej^ublicans  and  democrats,  catholics  and  protestants,  editors 
and  authors — everybody,  whose  mental  activity  extends 
beyond  neighborhood  gossip,  is  getting  more  or  less  a  feel- 
ing of  uncertainty  and  dread.  They  are  all  afraid  of  this, 
that,  and  the  other  group  or  clique.     They  have  all  practi- 

289 


290    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

cally  ceased  to  believe  in  the  traditional  moral  restraints 
and  sanctions,  l>ut  only  a  few  are  aware  of  it,  and  not  many 
have  a  clear  idea  of  what  would  take  their  place. 

Iliere  is  no  doubt  much  truth  in  the  accusations  of  every 
parly  or  group  against  the  others,  but  thinking  it  and  saying 
it  and  slurring  and  slamming  without  reconstruction  are 
very  primitive  and  unconvincing  ways  of  obtaining  agree- 
ment. The  agreements  in  those  fields  which  have  boosted 
the  world  during  the  last  century  have  come  from  investiga- 
tion and  conference.  But  in  religious  and  social  matters 
most  people  do  not  investigate^ — they  hear,  learn,  commit. 
They  do  not  confer — they  preach,  blame,  bluster.  There 
has  not  yet  taken  place  one  general,  serious  effort  to  investi- 
gate and  thoroughly  confer  upon  religious  problems. 
Churchmen,  as  a  rule,  are  utterly  unfamiliar  with  the  mood 
and  procedure  of  the  men  who  are  investigating  the  prob- 
lems which  are  included  under  the  terms  Physics,  Chemistry, 
Electricity,  Biology,  Psychology,  and  other  sciences.  The 
leaders  in  Religion  for  a  couple  of  centuries  have  boasted 
that  they  were  dealing  with  something  entirely  apart  from 
the  rest  of  man's  interests.  But  this  is  now  regarded  as 
only  a  childish  relic  of  a  professional  mood  left  over  from 
the  times  when  priests  dogmatized,  commanded,  and  threat- 
ened all  the  population  with  notions  and  theories  left  over 
from  still  earlier  times. 

Religious  doctrine  has,  in  consequence  of  this  long  per- 
sistent lack  of  renovation  and  corrective  readaptation,  be- 
come an  atavistic  portion  of  the  general  social  organism. 
It  is  a  principle  in  Biology  that  rudimentary  organs  endanger 
the  whole  organism.  Evolution  everywhere  tends  to  set 
aside  by  atrophy  the  organs  vvhich  new  environments  can 
no  longer  profitably  stimulate  to  helpful  use.  But  when  the 
organ's  use  is  outgrown  and  it  still  persists  in  enfeebled, 
inadequate  reactions,  inflammation  sets  in  and  the  whole 
organism  is  threatened  with  destruction.  The  instances  are 
found  by  millions.  In  the  human  body  the  "appendix"  (a 
rudimentary  remnant  of  a  very  early  stomach)  often  gets  in 
the  way  of  progress  and  has  to  be  cut  out. 


SCIENTIFIC  DOCTRINE   IMPERATIVE   NOW     291 

The  same  law  prevails  in  psychological,  sociologoical,  and 
not  less  in  religious  realms.  By  this  law  the  Church  is  in 
gravest  danger  of  either  wrecking  the  whole  social  body  or 
of  being  excised.  No  organ  can  survive  without  health  and 
wholesome,  useful  functioning.  Evolution  must  go  on. 
Evolution  will  go  on,  even  if  it  has  to  destroy  civilization 
again  and  again,  and  begin  all  over  at  some  lower  stage. 
The  social  body  must  have  its  organs  and  instruments  to 
furnish  its  nourishment  and  activities.  Will  the  Church 
continue  to  be  one  of  these? 

Sincerely  do  we  hope  so.  But  just  now  (for  a  century 
past),  it  is  not  filling  the  bill.  Both  from  within  and  without 
the  Church's  ranks  come  the  most  tremendous  alarms. 

ALARM    CRIES   ABOUT  SOCIAL   CONDITION'S 

Dr.  Lyman  Abbott  published  a  book  in  1910  called  The 
Spirit  of  Democracy."  In  that  book  he  discussed  the  prob- 
lems of  modern  industry.     Here  are  some  of  his  sentences : 

"Under  this  system  a  comparatively  small  l)ody  of  men 
own  all  the  tools  and  implements  with  which  industry  is 
carried  on:  the  land,  the  mines,  the  factories,  the  railways, 
the  forest;  and  a  great  body  of  men  do  the  work  with  these 
tools  and  implements,  not  owning  them.  The  men  who  own 
these  tools  and  implements  we  call  capitalists,  and  the  men 
who  do  the  work  with  these  tools  we  call  laborers. 

"Many  persons  imagine  that  the  wages  system  has  lasted 
from  eternity  and  will  last  to  eternity,  because  thev  have 
never  known  any  other  system.  In  point  of  fact,  it  was 
born  about  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  I 
do  not  believe  it  will  outlast  the  twentieth  century.  The 
evils  of  the  system  are  many  and  great,  and  have  been  often 
recognized  by  scholars  of  every  class. 

"1  do  not  believe  that  either  regulation  oi-  in'adual  moral 
reform  or  charity  will  set  the  world  right.  I  do  not  believe 
that  the  evil  of  our  present  system  will  be  cured  by  anv  thing 
less  than  a  radical  change." 

And  this  was  all  deliberately  written  several  years  ago  by 


292    A    RFXEIVERSIIIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

the  editor  of  THE  OUTLOOK,  a  revered  minister,  and  a 
man  who  holds  in  milHons  of  minds  the  place  of  one  of  the 
soberest  tliinkers  in  the  world.  He  is  no  youthful  "muck- 
raker"  or  "red  reformer,"  no  radical  mind,  for  he  was  in  his 
seventy-fifth  year  at  the  time  he  finished  the  book. 

Rev.  DuBois  H.  Loux,  Ph.  D.,  a  Congregational  Minister 
of  Meriden,  Conn,  and  formerly  of  Broadway  Tabernacle, 
New  York,  is  reported  as  follows,  on  the  occasion  of  his 
quitting  the  Church:  "Organized  Christianity  is  not  Christi- 
anity, but  ecclesiasticism.  I  hold  it  without  question  that 
organized  Christianity  today  is  dissolute.  It  is  playing  fast 
and  loose  with  the  principles  for  which  Christ  died.  It 
dares  not  be  true.  It  must  preach  doctrines  that  are  con- 
genial and  undisturbing.  Out  of  its  necessities,  it  feels  that 
it  must  keep  its  ear  to  the  ground  to  make  sure  that  the  world 
of  wealth  is  not  offended  in  it." 

To  Christian  leaders  of  Commerce,  this  preacher  declares, 
"All  the  world  knows  that  your  profit  does  not  create  any- 
thing, and  is  only  an  excuse  for  polite  brigandage.  You 
make  prices  and  plunder  the  land  of  its  health  and  liberty. 
If  you  did  your  duty,  for  democracy,  your  citizens  would 
have  time  for  art,  for  literature,  for  religion,  for  righteous- 
ness, for  health,  for  recreation,  for  home,  for  life.  But  the 
ten  that  toil  have  never  seen  the  light,  while  you  are  content 
to  paint  the  land  lurid  with  your  profits." 

Now  Rev.  Dr.  Loux  may  be  undiplomatic  and  blunt,  but 
he  is  not  a  morally  indifferent  man.  He  is  neither  an  "infi- 
del" nor  a  "grafter."  Nor  is  he  alone.  Scores  and  hun- 
dreds of  ministers  are  getting  clearer  headed,  and,  perhaps, 
getting  honest.  But  it  will  need  many  more  of  them — and 
wiser  manners.  If  they  were  evolved  far  enough  to  form 
a  nation-wide  union,  they  might  then  back  each  other  and 
preach  on  present  day  problems,     But — 

Woe  to  the  Church  in  any  age  when  it  lets  out  or  puts  out 
its  Luthers,  its  Wesleys,  its  Channings,  its  Emersons,  its 
Parkers.  Greece  did  this  with  its  Socrates,  its  Plato,  its 
Aristotle, — and  fell  at  once  a  prey  to  inner  decay  and  outer 
attack. 


SCIENTIFIC   DOCTRINE   IMPERATIVE   NOW     293 

Mr.  Thomas  A.  Edison  before  the  Civic  Federation  in 
New  York  made  these  clear  cut  statements  not  long  ago : 

"Poverty  will  be  abolished  from  the  world  within  the 
next  century.  Political  revolutions  are  imminent  in  both 
l^urope  and  America.  Within  a  short  time  England  will 
be  dominated  by  labor.  I  think  in  a  decade  this  country 
may  also  be.  Civilization  is  on  a  false  basis  and  must 
change  by  elimination  of  the  means  by  which  any  man  may 
take  that  which  he  has  not  made.  Universal  peace  or  gen- 
eral political  revolution  will  come  within  a  short  time." 

Are  we  going  to  realize  these  great  facts,  and  help  bring 
about  the  wondrous  change  in  an  orderly  way?  Unless  we 
and  thousands  more  do  so,  it  will  make  the  effort  to  arrive 
with  ignorance,  violence,  bloodshed,  and  by  a  revolution  that 
will  bring  not  a  thousandth  part  of  its  possible  good. 

Mr.  Frederick  Townsend  Martin  (millionaire,  banker, 
writer),  in  Everybody's  Magazine,  back  in  April,  191 1,  said: 

"Tomorrow  in  this  land  there  will  be  one  of  two  things — 
either  an  Evolution  or  a  Revolution. 

"I  do  not  want  to  be  considered  an  alarmist,  nor  to  cry 
panic  from  the  housetops.  Yet  in  the  light  of  facts,  I 
cannot  see  how  the  business  world  of  America  can  long 
escape  a  reckoning  that  has  for  years  been  overdue.  There 
has  to  be  in  this  country  an  adjustment  that  will  shake  the 
financial  and  business  world  to  its  foundations.  It  is  pc-^si- 
ble,  though  not  probable,  that  the  necessary  social  changes 
of  the  next  decade  can  be  accomplished  without  a  catacly.sm. 
But  the  concurrent  business  changes,  the  necessary  shifting 
of  the  bases  of  our  industrial  system,  the  inevitable  scaling 
down  of  the  extravagance  to  which  the  nation  as  a  whole 
has  become  accustomed,  are,  I  should  say,  utterly  impossible 
without  an  overwhelming  industrial   disturbance. 

"The  rank  and  file  of  the  class  1  represent  is  blind  and 
careless  .    .    .  As  a  class,  we  are,  today,  obstructionists. 

"Then  what  are  we  going  to  flo  about  it?" 

The  opinion  is  widespread,  that  Life  is  getting  more  an.l 
more    tangled.     Dispfxsitions    arc    getting    more    and    more 


294     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

crooked.     Crime  increases  above  and  below.     An  orderly 
state  of  society  is  fast  becoming  impossible. 

Professor  William  Herbert  Carruth  has  wonderfully  ex- 
pressed the  situation  in  a  poem: 

THE  TIME  TO  STRIKE 

My  God!  I  am  weary  of  waiting  for  the  year  of  jubilee. 
I  know  that  the  cycle  of  man  is  a  moment  only  to  Thee; 
They  have  held  me  back  with  preaching  what  the  patience  of 

God  is  like, 
But  the  world  is  weary  of  waiting;  will  it  never  be  time  to  strike? 

When  my  hot  heart  rose  in  rebellion  at  the  wrongs  my  fellows 

bore, 
It  was,  "Wait  until  prudent  saving  has  gathered  you  up  a  store;" 
And,  "Wait  till  a  higher  station  brings  value  in  men's  eyes;" 
And,  "Wait  till  the  gray-streaked  hair  shall  argue  your  counsel 

wise." 

The  hearts  that  kindled  with  mine  are  caught  in  the  self-same 

net; 
One  waits  to  master  the  law,  though  his  heartstrings  vibrate  yet; 
And  one  is  heaping  up  learning,  and  many  are  heaping  up  gold, 
And  some  are  fierce  in  the  forum,  but  slowly  we  all  wax  old. 

The  rights  of  men  are  a  byword;   the  bones  are  not  yet  dust 
Of  those  who  broke  the  shackles  and  the  shackles  are  not  yet 

rust 
Till   the   masters   are   forging   new   ones,   and   coward   lips   are 

sealed. 
While  the  code  that  cost  a  million  lives  is  step  by  step  repealed. 

The  wily  world-enchantress  is  working  her  cursed  charm, 

The  spell  of  the  hypnotizer  is  laming  us,  head  and  arm; 

The  wrong  dissolves  in  a  cloud-bank  of  "whether"  and  "if"  and 

"still." 
And  the  subtleties  of  logic  inhibit  the  sickly  will. 

The  bitter  lesson  of  patience  I  have  practiced,  lo,  these  years; 
Can  it  be  that  what  has  passed  for  prudence  was  prompted  by 

my  fears? 
Can  I  doubt  henceforth  in  my  choosing,  if  such  a  choice  I  must 

have, 
Between  being  wise  and  craven  or  being  foolish  and  brave? 


SCIENTIFIC  DOCTRINE  IMPERATIVE   NOW    295 

Whenever  the  weak  and  weary  are  ridden  down  by  the  strong. 
Whenever  the  voice  of  honor  is  drowned  by  the  howling  throng, 
Whenever  the  right  pleads  clearly  while  the  lords   of  life  are 

dumb, 
The  times   of  forbearance  are  over  and  the  time  to  strike   is 

come. 

These  criticisms  are  not  from  enemies.  They  are  from 
friends.  They  are  not  merely  strong.  They  are  prophetic 
thunderings,  foreboding  direful  outcomes.  They  are  the 
lamentations  of  new  Jeremiahs,  Isaiahs,  and  Micahs.  They 
are  alarming  exhortations  and  inspirations  towards  social 
righteousness. 

But,  if  these  and  hundreds  of  such  prophets  see  the  still 
bigger  truth,  they  mostly  fail  to  say  it.  That  further  awe- 
inspiring  truth  is,  that — 

IVe  cantwt  change  the  social  structure  on  the  basis  of 
the  old  faith. 

Christian  traditional  doctrine  contains  no  principles  or 
beliefs  that  are  capable  of  handling  the  new  social  order 
that  is  coming,  and  that  will  be  wrecked  in  the  building, 
if  it  is  attempted  to  rear  it  on  the  narrow  basis  of  by-gone 
ignorance.  No  church  creed,  no  bible  ever  knew  or  hinted 
a  hundredth  part  of  the  complications  that  the  twentieth 
century  is  socially  up  against.  Right  is  no  such  simple 
thing  as  Hebrew  minds  assumed.  To  deal  with  toda\-,  to 
save  civilization  from  another  reversion,  we  must  have 
directing  committees  who  know  the  di.scoverics  in  geological 
evolution,  in  Ijiology,  in  embryology,  in  heredity,  in 
physiological  psychology,  in  evolutional  sociology,  in 
psycho-social  politics,  and  in  history  seen  over  millenial 
stretches.  These  were  utterly  wanting  in  any  ancient  mind. 
IVe  have  the  facts.  IVe  have  the  men.  They  are  available. 
It  is  imbecile  to  continue  to  allow  out-of-date,  self-seeking, 
clique-mooded,  political  and  religious  mongcrers  to  continue 
to  control  human  affairs.  There  must  be  by  this  time  sev- 
eral millions  who  through  college,  university,  and  general 
reading  know  the  elements  of  the  various  sciences.  .'^ct 
these  people  at  work   in  scientific  conference  on  unsolvc«l 


296    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

social  and  religious  problems.  These  sciences  are  the  new 
human  outlook.  They  constitute  what  should  be  man's 
Cosmology  or  World  Conception  today.  They  furnish  the 
facts  for  the  religion  of  the  intelligent.  This  completely 
overshines  all  former  views.  It  has  created  a  new  heaven, 
a  new  earth,  a  new  man,  and  is  now  on  the  way  to  a  new 
social  order.  It  has  an  entirely  new  idea  of  God,  his  nature, 
his  modes  of  creation,  his  might,  his  presence  in  the  illimit- 
able abysses  of  space,  and  his  transformational  existence 
through  endless  cycles  of  worlds  and  systems. 

It  is  RELIGIOUS  RECONSTRUCTION  that  is  most  needed.  All 
other  would  follow  naturally  and  rapidly.  It  is  the  world- 
outlook  which  the  Church  preaches  that  blocks  or  impedes 
the  way.  The  men  who  teach  and  control  in  the  religious 
and  social  institutions  are  doomed  to  confess  that  the  world- 
theory  they  are  now  incompletely  floating  is  narrow  or 
wrong  or  inadequate. 

THE  PREACHING   NEEDED 

The  preachers  who  will  save  the  nations  from  that  peril- 
ous moral  degeneration  which  has  already  begun  and  which 
has  in  previous  ages  always  followed  religious  decay  will 
build  up  faith  anew  not  only  by  appealing  still  to  "God's 
ancient  revelations,"  but  far  more  to  the  broader  modern 
ones.  They  will  make  themselves  familiar  with  the  "Old 
Bible"  in  the  new  light  and  with  the  New  Bible  as  an  in- 
creasing light.  They  will  know  the  leading  facts  about  the 
Heavens  and  our  own  Solar  System  (Astronomy),  about 
our  Earth  and  its  long-eonian  evolution  (Geology),  about 
the  laws  of  Substance  and  Energy  (Physics),  about  Life 
and  its  untellable  years  of  upward  progress  (Biology),  and 
about  Man  and  his  rise  out  of  animal  savagery  toward 
universal  human  brotherhood  (Anthropology).  When  they 
know  the  larger  "revealed  word,"  they  will  cease  talking 
of  "the  conflict  between  Science  and  Religion."  They  will 
know  that  this  only  means  the  disharmony  between  old  and 
new    Science.     They    will    correct    the    impression    that 


SCIENTIFIC  DOCTRINE  IMPERATIVE   NOW    297 

"Science"  is  something  modern.  They  will  see  the  truism 
that  only  "Modern  Science"  is  modem;  that  what  the  an- 
cients learned  in  their  schools,  their  temples  and  elsewhere 
was  their  "Science,"  i.  e.,  their  systems  of  supposed  know- 
ledge. 

In  fewest  words,  let  preaching  now  be — 

Prospective  in  place  of  retrospective. 
Contemporary  in  place  of  traditional. 
Constructive  in  place  of  destructive. 
Afifirmative  in  place  of  negative. 
Inclusive  in  place  of  exclusive. 
Evolutionary  in  place  of  revolutionary. 
Sympathetic  in  place  of  vindictive. 


MANY  PEOPLE  BELIEVE 

THAT  A  WHOLE  LOT  OF  STILL  PLAINER 
TALK  IS  OVER-DUE  ABOUT  THIS  TIME— 

On  Education:  regarding  new  truths  of  life;  elimination  of 
old,  formal,  "disciplinary"  stuff;  getting  after  what  definitely 
helps;  new  preparation  for  new  environment;  relegating  college 
abstractions;  chasing  off  professorial  truckling;  and  making  un- 
comfortable every  other  resistance  to  progress  calling  itself 
"learning"  or  "culture." 

On  Marriage:  sex,  children,  common-sense  mating,  family, 
home-making,  divorce,  companionship,  partnership  in  life,  rights 
and  spheres  of  man  and  woman,  especially  of  woman,  etc. 

On  Defective  Humanity:  degenerates,  delinquents,  haphazard 
breeding;  effective  elimination,  penal  abominations,  fool  esti- 
mates of  what  crime  is;  the  little  crimes,  and  the  colossal  ones 
still  called  virtues. 

On  Economics:  the  unmoral,  un-Christian,  unhuman  ideas  on 
labor,  work,  slavery,  poverty,  riches,  robbery,  "justice,"  villainy 
(masquerading  as  captaining  industry),  generosity  (with  stolen 
and  worse  than  stolen  goods),  "public  charity"  (the  present  fad 
in  social  hypocrisy),  luxurious  remuneration  of  idlers,  and  the 
obtuse  despoilment  of  toilers. 

On  Religion:  credulity  and  reason;  facts  of  the  Universe  vs. 
old  whims;  priestly  sciolism,  ministerial  machiavellism;  cere- 
monial farces;  and  the  age-long,  lost-to-shame  bluff  about  "holy 
office"  and  "sacred  book." 


298 


CHAPTER  XXX 
SAMPLE  CLOSE-UPS  OF  THOUGHT-CONDITIONS 

Thousands,  perhaps  millions  in  the  Church  are  feelinjj  the 
upward,  onward  pull.     To  get  away  from  dogmas  that  have 
become  absurd  and  ridiculous  in  presence  of  twentieth  cen- 
tury enlightenment  is  now  an  anxiety  of  progressive  minds 
in  many  denominations.     A  short  time  ago  the  AVtc  York 
Presbytery  voted  sixty-four  to  three  in  favor  of  accepting 
for  the  ministry  three  Union  Theological  Seminary  gradu- 
ates all  of  whom  denied  the  virgin  birth  of  Christ  and  other 
miracle  stories  of  both  New  and  Old  Testaments !     And  the 
newspaper  editors   who   report  these  one-time  "sacrileges" 
take  open  sides  against  the  old  views.     They  go  far  afield  to 
tell  the  world  that  "Dogma  faces  severe  test  today.     It  can- 
not speak  with  ex-cathedra  voice  and  command  oliedience. 
It  is  interrogated  on  every  side  by  men  who  read  and  think 
and  question,  and  who  prove  it  by  its  value  when  applied 
to   the   real   problems  of   life.     Once   able   to   dwell   aloof, 
buttressed  by  ecclesiasticism,  it  must  now  meet  the  issues 
that  arise  out  of  men's  social,  business,  political,  and  inter- 
national  relations.     Once  asking  only  that   men  believe,   it 
is    now    compelled    to    accept    the    fact    that    men    reason. 
Dogma  yields  ground,  but   the  sphere  of  spiritual   service 
anfl   fellowship  widens."      (Chicago  Post) 

"The  Christian  Herald"  and  other  professedly  orthfulox 
religious  [)eriodicals  are  seeing  in  this  "a  new  spiritual 
awakening  that  is  sweeping  the  world."  Some  of  the  world 
is  surely  getting  aroused  tf)  higher  things,  but  it  is  not  con- 
sistent for  the  Church  to  call  it  a  "spiritual  awakening." 
It  is  everywhere  a  definite  departure  from  all  that  the 
Church  vocabulary  has  heretofore   inclu<lc<l  luidcr  "spirit- 

299 


300     A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

ual."  So  far  as  it  goes  it  is  a  mental  and  moral  bettermenl 
far  superior  to  anything  the  former  religionists  ever  knew. 
But  it  is  not  "sweeping  the  world,"  unless  we  mean  that  it 
and  other  things  are  sweeping  away  all  former  forms  of 
faith,  while  this  new  faith  is  not  yet  put  into  gospel  form 
to  replace  the  decaying  views. 

From  "liberal"  sources  the  momentous  change  is  seen 
with  an  entirely  different  interpretation.  The  Unitarian 
Layman's  League,  (a  national  organization  of  highest  stand- 
ing) in  "A  Statement  to  the  Country"  at  the  end  of  1920 
says :  "We  are  rapidly  becoming  a  nation  without  religion. 
...  A  historic  change,  grievous  in  its  injury  and  perhaps 
ominous  of  disaster,  is  befalling  this  heir  and  hope  of  the 
ages,  the  United  States  of  our  Republic.  Along  with  this 
loss  of  religiousness  have  gone  scorn  of  moral  principles 
and  threats  against  ordered  liberty.  We  see  this  all  about 
us.  The  moral  order  in  industry,  in  the  family,  in  personal 
life,  is  not  only  often  thrust  aside  as  impertinent,  but  is 
denounced  as  the  mere  tyranny  of  arbitrary  convention, 
.  .  .  Here  is  a  crisis  .  .  .  We  Americans  are  falling  from 
our  greatest  tradition ;  we  are  endangering  our  character  and 
our  soul  as  a  people  .  .  .  It  is  time  for  plain  speech  and 
vigorous  action." 

Rev.  John  Haynes  Holmes  of  New  York  says,  "The  Great 
War  has  thrown  down  all  denominational  lines  between 
Protestant  churches."  "It  was  a  colossal  assumption  to 
believe  that  the  Protestant  churches  on  old  denominational 
lines,  could  exist  after  the  War.  There  must  be  a  recon- 
struction all  along  the  line." 

Dr.  Holmes  has  recently  claimed  to  take  the  old  and  well- 
known  Church  of  the  Messiah  out  of  the  Christian  class, 
has  "put  the  Social-Democratic  stamp  indelibly  upon  its 
work,  and  has  made  it  take  "rank  with  the  school,  the 
library,  the  community  center  as  a  public  institution  for 
public  service."  This  act  retains  the  Church  as  a  method 
of  effective  work  on  the  social  body,  while  it  changes  from 
ancient  Jewish  Doctrine  to  Modern  Science  Outlook.  It 
puts  the  new  modern  content  into  the  old  institution.     Be- 


CLOSE-UPS  OF  THOUGHT  CONDITIONS    301 

lief  in  this  or  that  theological  speculation  is  no  longer  a 
basis  for  membership. 

It  is  nothing  short  of  a  general  breakdown  of  former 
church  assumptions  that  is  indicated  by  this  loosening  up 
of  doctrinal  lines  and  this  effort  to  sink  differences  and  fall 
in  with  the  practical  interests  of  an  age  rapidly  changing 
its  views  under  pressure  of  investigation.  On  the  part  of 
many  church  people,  it  is  simply  a  yielding  laxity  in  doctrine 
(without  the  understanding  of  the  facts),  mainly  in  order  to 
retain  their  foothold,  to  be  popular,  to  secure  membership, 
and  to  maintain  the  institution.  With  a  smaller  number, 
it  is  a  growth  in  intelligence  and  a  genuine  yearning  for  a 
larger  social  usefulness  and  a  better  world.  Some  one  has 
aptly  termed  this  an  effort  toward  "Christian  International- 
ism." But  nine-tenths  of  them  do  not  know  that  for  its 
accomplishment,  all  former  dogmatic  meanings  of  "Chris- 
tian" are  bound  to  be  outgrown.  Christianity  has  stood  for 
a  now  antiquated  World-Conception,  a  primitive  Cosmology. 
It  cannot  quietly  cease  to  emphasize  this  and  try  to  regain 
popularity  by  merely  falling  in  with  the  social  ideals  and 
regime  that  belong  to  the  new  Scientific  Cosmology.  // 
cannot  play  two  ways — read  from  the  old  books  and  urge 
the  new  social  order.  It  cannot  longer  continue  to  read  into 
the  old  authorities  the  new  doctrines.  It  cannot  read  Geology 
into  Genesis.  Nor  can  it  read  Evolutional  Sociology  into 
the  Neo-Judaic  Gospels  and  Epistles. 

After-War  rallies  are  the  order  of  the  day — conventions 
galore — projected  unions  at  every  point  of  the  compass — 
cooperation  in  social  movements — calls  for  revivals.  The 
religious  press  resounds  with  these.  But  nearly  all  of  them 
are  efforts  to  re-rally  interest  in  fjld  doctrines,  to  try  to  make 
them  serve  recognized  modern  social  needs.  Beautiful  in 
purpose,  yet  more  and  more  failing  in  efficiency.  As  an 
inhibitor  of  primitive  conduct,  the  Church  is  not  fifty  per- 
cent efficient.  As  a  stimulator  to  truth-seeking,  it  is  not 
five  percent  efficient.  Its  service  under  out-of-date  doc- 
trines and  with  empty  forms  is  so  lacking  in  accomplishment 
that  it  could  not   hold  its  jr)b  under  any  modern  business 


302     A    RIXEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

manager.     It  "soldiers  on  the  job,"  simply  because  it  has  an 
immense  economic  plant  and  a  long-standing  organization. 

Hut  the  age  has  arrived  when  revivals  cannot  save  it. 
"Revival"  is  not  and  never  was  progress.  Revival  is  simply 
reiteration,  to  the  stage  of  excitement.  Once,  revival  could 
spread  and  affect  the  masses.  Now,  the  masses  cannot  be 
affected  even  by  the  most  frenzied  and  threatening  reitera- 
tion. Once  the  ancient  doctrines  permeated  literature  and 
were  backed  by  government.  Now  our  national  and  state 
governments,  through  universities,  museums,  Smithsonian, 
Rockefeller  and  Carnegie  Institutions,  are  expending 
millions  yearly  to  discover,  publish,  and  propagate  Science, 
the  truth  on  which  is  based  the  religion  urged  in  these  pages. 
Not  a  cent  do  they  spend  directly  toward  maintaining  forms 
of  religious  traditionalism.  This  tells  the  story.  The  final 
outcome  is  in  sight. 

The  eminent  English  writer,  Samuel  Laing,  in  the  wide- 
ly known  book,  "Modern  Science  and  Modern  Thought," 
says : 

"The  conclusions  of  Science  are  irresistible  and  old  forms 
of  faith,  however  venerable  and  however  endeared  by  a 
thousand  as.sociations,  have  no  chance  in  a  collision  with  it." 
"The  creeds  must  be  transformed  or  die." 

Sir  John  Lubbock  (later  Lord  Avebury)  in  his  "Origin 
of  Civilization"  wrote: 

"To  Science  we  owe  the  idea  of  progress.  It  is  not  going 
too  far  to  say,  that  the  true  test  of  the  civilization  of  a  nation 
must  now  be  measured  by  its  progress  in  Science." 

This  attitude  now  inspires  a  large  part  of  the  journalism 
of  leading  nations.  It  is  increasingly  imbuing  the  literature 
of  the  world.  Clearer  and  clearer  it  is  being  realized  that 
the  out-aged  traditionalism  has  been  one  of  the  two  chief 
causes  that  has  kept  the  world  nearly  static  for  so  long. 

Walter  Bagehot  in  "Physics  and  Politics"  says:  "The 
Ancients  had  no  conception  of  Progress;  they  did  not  so 
much  as  reject  the  idea;  they  did  not  even  entertain  it." 
Then  why  should  we,  generation  after  generation  and  cen- 
tury after  century,  keep  on  taking  them  and  their  books  as 


CLOSE-UPS  OF  THOUGHT  CONDITIONS     303 

authority,  as  the  basis  for  our  education,  our  religion,  our 
morals?  We  can  read  them,  but  not  in  college,  and  only 
after  we  have  arrived  at  powers  of  discrimination.  They 
are  instructive  as  history.  They  are  ideals  only  to  people 
who  are  not  abreast  of  these  far  greater  times. 

Parker  H.  Sercomhe  has  tersely  put  the  case  thus:  "Man 
has  reached  thought-integrity  in  ever}-  field  of  research, 
inquiry,  discovery,  and  organization  in  which  traditional  in- 
stitutions have  kept  their  hands  ofif;  but  the  world  still  re- 
mains in  a  sordid  condition  of  stupidity  in  every  field  in 
which  traditional  institutions  have  retained  their  clutch,  and 
thus  per\'erted  the  onward  march  toward  honesty,  accuracy, 
health,  and  peace." 

WILL  THE  CHURCH  COME  OVER  TO  SCIENCE? 

Can  the  Church  change  from  an  association  of  "believers 
in  old  traditions"  to  an  organization  proclaiming  the  results 
of  recent  investigation  and  thinking?  Will  it  cease  to  be 
a  close  corporation  of  salvation  seekers  and  become  a  volun- 
teer band  of  truth  seekers  and  civic  servers?  In  the  course 
of  centuries,  the  Church  has  become  a  hollow  organizaticjn. 
I  am  not  thinking  of  it  morally.  Morally,  the  ("hurch  is 
as  good  and  better  than  the  part  of  the  community  that 
neglects  it.  The  Church's  chief  (litliculty  is  in  lack  of 
knowledge  and  facts.  The  Church  does  not  know  the  world 
it  is  talking  about.  Its  "facts"  have  been  mostly  ancient 
guesses.  When  the  Church  came  into  being  as  an  organi/n 
tion  it  accei)te(l  the  ideas  of  the  ancient  wcjrld  abcnil  the 
heavens,  the  earth.  Cod,  man,  morals,  scKicty,  state,  time, 
space,  matter,  life,  growth,  education,  books,  authoiitics,  etc. 
In  not  a  single  instance  does  the  modern  world  hold  these 
views.  Everything  ancient  in  theory  is  discounted  to  so 
great  an  extent  as  to  be  no  longer  currency.  Hence  to 
longer  cling  to  the  cfjncejjls  of  the  Classic  or  Hebrew  minds 
is  preposterous.  No  one  does  it,  except  in  those  moments 
when  he  is  under  the  domination  of  fixed  ideas  incnlcatc<l 
in  his  early  years,  before  he  began  to  think.     The  m(K)d  is 


304    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

a  habit  of  centuries.  It  arrests  the  development  of  millions. 
And  it  does  not  accomplish  the  pacification  or  the  unification 
of  humanity. 

MANKIND   NOW   REACHING  UNITY 

The  old  traditional  religions  have  preached  and  threatened 
and  stewed  for  ages  to  bring  humanity  into  their  camps  or 
to  make  their  various  camps  conterminous  with  the  world. 
So,  too,  the  old  politics  in  the  form  of  military  monarchism 
has  tried  by  might  and  by  diplomacy  to  bring  the  peoples 
into  one  realm  of  influence.  They  have  both  failed — shame- 
fully, if  we  pair  their  insignificant  achievements  with  their 
loud  claims  and  boasts  and  demands.  Indeed,  there  never 
was  the  slightest  chance  that  either  traditional  religion  or 
traditional  politics  could  solve  the  world's  problems. 

But  the  real  unifier  is  arriving.  Science  in  the  form  of  a 
thousand  inventional  improvements  in  methods  of  defense, 
aggression,  living-getting  machinery,  transportation,  com- 
munication— all  ending  in  world-commerce,  is  doing  the  job. 
The  unparalleled  achievements  in  the  use  of  powers  of  na- 
ture for  carrying  out  the  wants  of  man  by  wind  and  water 
and  steam  and  gas  and  electricity  and  ether  have  begun  to 
make  the  earth  one  neighborhood,  and  its  people  are  in  sight 
of  seeing  themselves  one  people.  Barbarians  and  savages 
can  no  longer  keep  civilization  out  of  their  jungles  or  fast- 
nesses. No  band  of  bandits  in  Abyssinia  or  Mexico  can 
long  escape  the  eagle  eye  and  bombing  talons  of  modern 
airplanes  and  dirigibles.  "Come  into  the  League  of  Hu- 
manity, now,  if  you  will — but  soon,  whether  you  will  or 
not."  And  no  imprecations  to  hoary  gods  with  ancient 
feelings,  no  attenuated  dogmas  passed  down  by  priests  of 
such  imagined  creatures,  no  books  collected  in  ignorant  ages 
by  traditional  bigots — no,  not  these  nor  any  other  opposition 
can  stem  the  tide  of  this  new  stage  of  man.  Science  and 
Commerce  are  the  world's  hope.  These  and  their  facts 
(not  preaching  and  its  legends)  are  bringing  progress,  pros- 
perity, and  comfort. 


CLOSE-UPS  OF  THOUGHT  CONDITIONS    305 

To  collect  these  facts,  to  announce  them,  to  show  the 
needy  masses  their  meaning,  to  urge  the  just  distribution 
of  their  benefits,  to  be  untiring  sentinels  guarding  against 
past  forms  of  life,  past  ideas,  or  past  conduct  intruding 
themselves  into  these  glorious  prospects — this  will  surely  be 
enough  to  occupy  those  who  believe  in  church  assemblies  and 
church  social  relations  as  methods  of  human  betterment. 


CHAPTER  XXXI 
RETICENCE  OF  SCIENCE  DANGEROUS 

Modern  investigators  are,  as  a  class,  not  given  to  pushing 
their  views,  if  these  views  affect  social  or  religious  theory. 
Their  deep-seated  aversion  partly  explains  the  slow  spread 
of  the  broadening  movement,  in  matters  social  and  religious, 
'mid  the  present  otherwise  rapid  progress.  The  investigator 
in  things  mental  is  afraid  of  giving  offense,  or  he  dreads 
the  possible  reaction  upon  his  own  welfare,  if  he  talks.  His 
practice  is  in  strong  contrast  with  the  many  moral  and 
social  theorists  who  are  always  loud  in  proclaiming  their 
generally  borrowed  speculations  and  isms.  These  moral 
reformers  are  usually  yet  in  dogmatic  mood.  They  have 
outgrown  some  of  their  former  traditions  and  have  adopted 
a  new  vocabulary  on  a  few  problems,  but  they  have  not 
changed  their  manners  or  methods.  They  deal  in  condem- 
nations and  authorities. 

On  the  other  hand,  few  of  the  scientific  mooded  people 
have  yet  reached  a  sense  of  social  solicitude.  They  have 
still  to  learn  that  those  who  attain  advanced  and  proven 
ideas  shall  also  be  heralds  of  them.  The  honor  carries  an 
obligation.     All  honors  do. 

it's  up  to  you — MEN  OF  SCIENCE! 

Before  the  "Age  of  Science,"  progress  was  made  by 
speculators,  moralists,  fanatics.  Seldom  did  anybody  in- 
vestigate. Around  the  occasional  new  guesses  sects  formed, 
committed  the  new  authorities  to  memory  and  built  up  new 
traditions.  These  ran  the  usual  gamut  and  became  so  effete 
as  to  produce  new  speculations.     An  entirely  new  type  of 

306 


RETICENCE  OF   SCIENCE  DANGEROUS    307 

mental  activity  is  now  taking  possession  of  human  conduct. 
The  contrast  between  the  traditional  mentality  that  domin- 
ated all  the  yesterdays  and  the  investigative  inquiry  that 
alone  is  satisfying  to  the  twentieth  century  brain,  is  so  great 
as  to  be  realized  by  very  few  people  yet.  And  this  outlook 
— rivalling  in  distinctness  that  between  Geological  eras — 
is  already  laying  down  new  mental  and  social  strata,  or 
conditions  of  history.  It  is  burying  every  sort  of  orthodoxy. 
It  is  becoming  ludicrous  and  absurd  to  cater  to  superstition 
and  apologize  for  placing  our  faith  and  practice  in  the  series 
with  others  in  historic  analyses. 

But  with  all  the  advance,  it  is  clear  to  long-range  observers 
that  our  progress  has  been  mostly  made  by  the  very  mass  of 
it,  rather  than  by  purposive,  intentional  plan.  The  thnc  is 
fully  ripe  for  direct  and  concerted  cooperation  in  the  efjorl 
to  organize  this  mass  of  nezvly  established  facts  into  helpful 
movements.  There  is  unspeakable  danger  in  waiting. 
"Dark  Ages"  are  quite  possible  again.  There  is  nothing  to 
lose  by  action.  The  superstitious  and  ultra-traditional  are 
not  very  powerful  any  longer.  Mostly  they  do  nut  half 
believe  their  own  professions.  They  are  shilly-shally  aiul 
only  pretendedly  hjyal.     They  are  not  to  be  feared. 

An  English  Canon  has  lately  undertaken  to  estimate  the 
number  of  people  who  seriously  read  the  Ijible.  His  con- 
clusion (published  broadcast  through  the  London  Daily 
Chronicle)  is,  that  in  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  only  one 
person  in  22,000  reads  the  Bible  zvith  the  serious  7'iew  to 
making  it  the  guide  of  life!  This  is  an  amazing  admis.uon. 
It  has  a  startling  meaning.  If  traditional  Christian  propa- 
gators have  deserted  their  own  source  of  dogma,  why  lake 
them  seriously  any  longer? 

"The  Sunday  School  Time.<;"  recently  printed  an  arlicle 
by  /.  Stxiort  Holden,  D.  D.,  (I-'ditor  (jf  "The  Christian") 
in  which  he  said:  "Great  expectations  of  a  stui)cn(I(nis  re- 
vival as  an  outcome  of  the  War  have  been  disai)i)ointc(l. 
Many  of  those  who  for  the  lime  being  turned  from  the 
aggressive  ministry  of  (iod's  Word  literally  to  ^crvc  tables 
excused    themselves    by    the   hope    that    the   profciund    and 


3o8    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR   CIVILIZATION 

searching  experiences  through  which  nations  and  individuals 
were  passing  would  create  a  God-ward  movement,  and  that 
when  the  excitements  and  anxieties  were  well  over  we 
should  find  a  new  and  religious  world  in  being. 

"How  far  otherwise  is  the  actual  state  of  things  today? 
The  majority  of  men  who  are  returning  home  are  no  more 
interested  in  religion  than  they  were  before  they  went  out. 
.  .  .  That  they  are  heroes,  no  one  for  a  moment  denies. 
That  they  are  saints — simply  because  of  their  matchless 
courage  under  battle  fire — they  are  themselves  the  first  to 
repudiate.  They  were  not  much  impressed  by  the  churches 
before  the  War,  and  they  are  certainly  no  more  impressed 
now.  In  many  cases  they  are  even  more  indifferent  .  .  . 
The  only  apparent  revival  is  of  worldliness,  selfishness,  and 
open  godlessness." 

But  Dr.  Holden  has  no  remedy  except  to  redouble  our 
energies  to  give  the  world  more  of  the  things  it  is  more  and 
more  repudiating! 

From  every  quarter,  within  and  without,  come  the  most 
humiliating  admissions  and  scathing  criticisms  of  Church 
failure.  Rev.  E.  Guy  Talbot  in  "The  Christian  Work"  has 
just  said  a  lot  of  things  under  the  title  "Is  The  Church  a 
Failure?"  He  even  takes  the  pains  to  collect  the  most 
damaging  condemnation,  quoting  and  citing  articles  in  mag- 
azines and  great  papers.  An  especially  notable  passage  is 
from  an  editorial  in  the  "St.  Louis  Republic,"  which  says: 
"The  Church  has  been  losing  its  influence,  there  is  no  man- 
ner of  doubt,  and  the  reasons  are  not  hard  to  find.  It  is 
getting  further  away  from  Christ  and  nearer  to  Croesus. 
The  Church  has  departed  from  the  masses  to  take  up  with 
the  classes.  The  Church,  today,  is  not  preaching  the  gospel 
of  that  Christ  who  drove  the  money  changers  out  of  the 
Temple.  The  money  changers  are  being  chased  into  the 
Temple  amid  paeans  of  joy  and  escorted  by  smiling  ingra- 
tiating preachers  of  the  Word.  They  are  an  ornament  to 
the  Church  under  the  new  Dollar  Divinity." 

The  wide  difference  between  the  simple  old  doctrinal 
traditionalism  of  our  fathers,  trying  to  renovate  human  life 


RETICENCE  OF   SCIENCE  DANGEROUS     309 

by  turning  it  back  to  olden  ideas,  and  that  of  the  semi- 
speculative,  semi-scientific  work  so  often  tried  today,  is  very 
clearly  seen  in  a  191 8  book  on  "Human  Nature  and  Its 
Remaking"  by  Professor  William  Ernest  Hocking  of  Har- 
vard University.  It  is  a  profound  study  and  a  long  advance 
from  the  antiquated  church  theories,  but  it  lacks  the  direct- 
ness and  simplicity  of  a  scientific  application  of  the  facts 
of  today. 

The  time  has  come  for  conferences  striving  to  reconstruct 
the  cosmical  and  social  outlooks.  A  few  plain  unostenta- 
tious meetings,  like  those  of  the  American  or  British  Asso- 
ciations for  the  Advancement  of  Science,  quietly  and 
seriously  formulating  the  results  of  modern  investigations 
on  social  and  religious  problems,  and  the  great  change 
would  be  under  way. 

THE  MEN  AHEAD 

The  men  of  Science  are,  for  the  most  part,  paid  to  teach 
in  established  ways.  Their  advanced  research  has  mostly 
to  be  done  "after  hours,"  or  as  an  avocation.  Seldom  do 
original  men  earn  a  livelihood  through  their  most  advanced 
ideas.  They  continually  have  to  resort  to  something  only 
half  as  interesting,  and  they  undoubtedly  waste  three-fourths 
of  their  invaluable  time.  This  is  altogether  true  in  the  later 
sciences  and  in  those  fields  not  yet  fully  reduced  to  scientific 
cultivation.  The  further  development  and  application  of 
scientific  labors  depend  very  largely  on  donations,  aids,  and 
privileges  from  generous  and  more  or  less  appreciative 
people. 

The  only  incentives  of  the  leaders  must  be  the  breath  of 
expectation,  fame,  passion  for  human  progress,  or  disposi- 
tion to  be  helpful.  But  their  best  results  are  never  possible 
because  of  their  necessitated  toil  for  bread  and  butter.  It 
has  come  about  that  the  really  advanced  worker  is  supposed 
and  expected  to  give  his  life  for  "The  Cause."  Why  so? 
Is  there  any  more  reason  why  he  should  do  it  than  why  the 
rest  should  do  likewise  or,  at  least,  support  iiim  in  it?    As 


310    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

now  practised,  he  takes  the  lead,  spends  every  possible  extra 
moment  in  producing  new  facts  and  getting  them  into  prac- 
ticable form ;  but  others  pick  up  the  new  opportunities,  boss 
the  later  jobs,  and  get  the  emoluments  and  first  honors. 

All  this  is  worse  than  wrong.  It  is  absurd.  It  is  an 
incalculable  loss  to  the  society  that  perpetrates  it.  It  is,  in 
modern  phrase,  "inefficient"  human  living.* 

Either  our  civilization  will  go  down  to  defeat  because  of 
unequal  progress  between  the  material  and  the  ethical  sides 
of  life,  or  some  body  of  men  who  know  the  higher,  larger 
facts  will  call  themselves  together  and  formulate  what 
Science  now  holds  to  be  these  facts  about  the  universe,  the 
world,  life,  man,  mind,  society,  nation,  race,  progress,  duty, 
and  purpose.  The  Preachers  and  Priests  do  not  know — 
and  do  not  zvant  to  know.  The  Scientists  do  know — and  do 
not  want  to  tell. 

If  there  should  not  take  place  in  the  near  future  various 
patriotic  movements  among  men  of  Science  to  confer  and 
proclaim  in  popular  language  the  facts  and  laws  of  life  and 
progress,  then  various  bodies  of  people  who  understand 
Science  more  or  less  must  get  together  and  do  this.  The 
schools  are  getting  paid  for  doing  it,  but  they  lose  nine- 
tenths  of  their  students  in  bookish  pedantries  and  proprieties 
before  graduation.  They  turn  out  enough  annually  to  re- 
deem the  world,  but  they  forget  to  tell  them  the  world  needs 
redemption. 

Surely,  ere  this,  the  men  engaged  in  discovery  and  its 
explanation  should  have  seen  to  it  that  their  facts  reached 
the  people.  But  the  truth  is  that  very  few  of  them  are 
writing  for  the  people.  They  write  with  a  view  to  each 
other's  criticism.  Hence  their  books  are  "hard  to  under- 
stand."    If    scientists   are   not   seeing   to   this   because   of 

*  "The  world  is  turning  a  critical  corner.  Mighty  things  are 
doing.  Civilization  is  in  the  awful  throes  of  rebirth  and  this 
stupendous  upheaval  will,  in  all  probability,  vitally  change  your 
life  and  th(>  lives  of  every  living  man  and  woman  about  you." 
—From  W.  J.  Funk  of  the  "Literary  Digest"  (October,  1920), 
Vice  President  of  The  Funk  and  Wagnalls  Publishing  House. 


RETICENCE  OF   SCIENCE  DANGEROUS    311 

thoughtlessness  or  indifference,  then  those  who  are  not  in- 
different must  dift'use  the  knowledge.  The  noisy  erudites 
in  church  and  school  and  politics  will  deny  the  need.  But 
multitudes  are  no  longer  asking  their  views  on  these  mat- 
ters. They  have  had  their  day.  None  ever  had  so  great 
opportunity.  They  neither  see  the  conditions  nor  have  the 
social  solicitude. 

Organized  efforts,  here,  there,  and  ever>'where,  are  the 
pressing  need.  The  facts,  truths,  laws,  principles  are  known. 
They  can  be  easily  gathered.  The  dominance  of  superstition 
can  be  ended.  The  danger  of  the  collapse  of  civilization 
can  be  set  aside.  Such  an  effort  will  soon  smoke  out  the 
traditionalists  who  are  the  cause  of  the  stagnation. 

When  this  movement  is  actually  under  way,  tiie  men  of 
Science  will  realize  where  their  work  stands  sociologically. 
They  will  get  a  far  wider  credit  for  their  discoveries,  and 
will  be  publicly  held  responsible  for  their  truth  and  genuine- 
ness. Then  they  will  soon  perceive  the  danger  of  discredit 
from  their  previous  impractical  neglect  in  not  taking  a  hand 
in  furthering  both  publication  and  application  to  human  life. 
They  will  see  that  they  cannot  stand  aside  like  the  philoso- 
phers of  old  or  the  monks  of  the  Middle  .\ges.  while  society 
stumbles  on  to  ruin.  It  will  be  clear  to  them  that  it  is  better 
to  come  out  and  lead  than  to  risk  misrepresentation  bv  half- 
informed  enthusiasts.  Such  movements  will  bring  the  dis- 
coverers and  investigators  out  of  unsocial  seclusion  and  into 
conference  and  practical  action. 

//  not  for  life's  bcttcnuott,  7vhy  t/alhcr  we  our  fads? 
Shall  we  wait  as  did  former  thinkers  till  the  State  is  pulled 
down  over  our  heads?  Archimedes  dawdled  with  his  puz- 
zles while  Syracuse  and  Sicily  crashed.  Aristotle  tutored 
the  very  tyrant  who  was  getting  ready  to  destroy  his  own 
dear  Hellas.  He  and  his  compeer  thinkers  doubted  the  old 
and  did  not  get  together  on  any  new.  while  the  people  wen! 
into  indifference,  and  (irccce  became  ea.sy  prey  for  the 
greedy  Macedonian  Alexander. 

To  bring  truth  to  the  pef)ple  by  heart  to  heart  conference 
on  human  interests  surelv  is  the  onlv  excuse  for  discovering 


312    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

it.  In  appealing  tones  Life  is  now  calling  for  all  investi- 
gators to  get  together  and  write  and  tell  the  world  their 
findings.  In  mutual  fears,  in  cynical  criticisms  of  each 
others'  books  and  in  obliviousness  of  the  needs  of  the  Social 
Order,  lurks  catastrophe  for  civilization.  To  wait  for 
natural  selection  would  be  cruelty  unnamable.  To  be  sure, 
it  will  slowly  kill  off  the  unfit  and  perhaps  build  a  half- 
fledged  race  in  a  hundred  thousand  years  or  more!  Man, 
the  thinker,  could  build  a  grand  humanity  in  one  short 
hundred  years  by  rallying  to  a  Theology  that  is  Natural 
grounded  in  a  Science  that  is  Modern. 

THEREFORE,    WANTED: 

People  who  think  it  normal  to  desire  to  know  the  latest 
and  uttermost  facts. 

People  who  love  truth  and  fact  enough  to  welcome  in- 
vestigation—even of  their  cherished  traditions  and  sacred 
prejudices. 

People  who  see  the  failure  of  traditional  theories  not  only 
in  material  fields,  but  also  in  economic,  moral,  and  religious. 

People  who  will  deeply  sympathize  with  others  who  are 
alike  troubled. 

People  who,  though  comfortable,  are  yet  human. 

People  who  have  learned  that  the  highest  things  are 
attained  only  by  combining. 

People  whose  ideals  are  not  to  be  "Knights"  of  old  faiths 
going  out  in  crusades  against  champions  of  other  old  faiths. 
(E.  g..  Crusaders'  attacks  on  Moslems,  both  of  whom  drew 
their  muddled  traditions  from  the  same  ancient  Jewish 
legends.) 

People  who  examine  and  think,  who  are  looking  for  facts, 
and  who  have  the  heart  to  spread  scientific  enlightenment 
to  the  belated  millions. 

People  who  will  work  with  might  and  main  to  build 
Modern  Schools  and  Modern  Churches — institutions  which 
will  not  make  and  then  graduate  comfortable  and  unawak- 


RETICENCE  OF   SCIENCE  DANGEROUS     313 

able  indifferents,  educational  and  religious  bigots,  political 
and  commercial  thieves. 

People  who  are  bent  on  establishing  an  education  that 
cares  for  life  that  is  living,  more  than  for  life  that  is  dead. 

People  who  will  not  set  themselves  up  as  educators  till 
they  are  beyond  putting  the  stress  on  languages  long  dead, 
on  square  and  cube  root,  on  alligation  and  alliquot  parts,  on 
complex  fractions  and  algebra,  on  antiquated  spelling  and 
parsing;  while  they  stupidly  ignore  physiology  and  hygiene, 
sex  and  parentage,  biology  and  heredity,  eugenics  and  eco- 
nomics, psycholog}'  and  sociology,  living-getting  and  voca- 
tional examinations. 

People  who  will  dread  the  laugh  of  the  twenty-first  cen- 
tury enlightenment  over  the  puerile  bluff  and  polished  cant 
which  our  times  called  "Education." 

People  of  wealth  and  vision  who  wish  to  assist  the  be- 
wildered many  by  undertaking  world-wide  propaganda, 
spreading  already  demonstrated  truth,  thus  replacing  de- 
moralizing conditions  by  glorious  progress. 

People  who  can  write  and  who  will  use  literary  art  to 
portray  the  wondrous  demonstrations  of  today  and  replace 
the  childish  vagaries  of  yesterday. 

People  of  these  types  who  will  get  together  in  spirit  and 
effort,  by  thousands  and  millions. 


CAN  THE  CHURCH  SAVK  CIVHJZATION 

and,  thus  only,  preserve  its  own  Grand  Organization  and 
Equipment? 

YES 

By  graciously  Speeding  a  Receivership  into  the  Facts, 
Truths,  and  Doctrines  of  the  All-compassing  Inquiry  and 
the  Irrevocable  Authority  of 

MODERN   SCIENCE 


3M 


CHAPTER  XXXII 
IF  WE  MUST  HAVE  A  CREED 

To  the  traditionalist,  no  creed  is  possible,  unless  drawn 
from  his  "sacred  books."  All  other  formulations  are  to  him 
"infidelity"  or  "heathenism."  This  volume  is  full  of 
affirmations  in  which  he  can  see  only  negation  of  everything 
precious. 

But  it  is  a  fact  that  will  grow  clearer  with  years  of 
scientific  mood,  that  the  speculative  doctrines  of  the  yester- 
times  were  the  real  negations,  in  that  they  became  so  dog- 
matically held  as  to  arrest  the  development  of  millions  and 
billions  of  human  minds.  They  made  men  live  with  "fixed 
ideas"  so  long  and  so  earnestly,  that  they  came  to  regard 
growth  as  destruction. 

To  leave  the  worn-out  behind  is  not  and  never  was  nega- 
tion. It  is  just  the  way  of  Nature.  It  is  merely  natural 
exolution.  To  put  our  load  on  the  motor-truck  now  is 
better  transportation — even  though  wc  are  sorr>-  to  leave  the 
olfl  wheel-barrow  by  the  roadside.  To  tour  in  the  auto- 
mobile, the  pullman  car  or  the  aeroplane,  of  course,  means 
to  part  with  the  dear  old  ox-team.  But  who  is  going  to  stay 
behind? 

THE  CREED  OF  SCIENCE 

I.  I  BELIEVE  that  in  recent  times  the  Disanrriiw  .)f 
honest,  truth-telling  men — Scientists — have  been  so  numer- 
ous, so  extensive,  .so  profound  in  every  department  of  human 
interest,  that  an  entire  reconstruction  of  ideas  about  the 
Ifcavens,  the  liarth,  the  l.if'\  ;iiid  the  I'oivcrs.  anri  conse- 
quently of  religious  and  social  belief,  is  made  essential  for 

315 


3i6    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 

every  person  who  puts  the  possession  of  truth  above  in- 
difference or  error. 

II.  I  BELIEVE  our  "Creeds"  should  be  summaries  of 
what  we  individually  nozv  think  to  be  true  regarding  the 
Universe  and  Man,  and  that  as  knowledge  increases  and  our 
reasoning  powers  grow  into  greater  scope,  our  creeds  should 
be  frequently  and  carefully  revised. 

III.  I  BELIEVE  that  there  is  back  of  all  else  an  Infinite, 
Eternal  Energy,  a  Self-existent  Essence  and  Source,  an 
Illimitable  Power  that  evolves  all  worlds,  all  life  and  growth, 
all  death  and  decay,  an  All-pervading  Ether  or  Spirit  Back- 
ground, a  Universal  and  Unfathomable  Basic  Condition  of 
Existence — "God." 

IV.  I  BELIEVE  that  man's  constant  discovery  of  facts 
and  truths  is  to  him  "Revelation,"  that  revelation  is  an  un- 
veiling not  of  "God's  face"  but  of  man's,  and  that  the  way 
of  life  is  made  known  to  us  in  the  verified  discoveries  and 
teachings  of  Science  and  in  the  examples  and  lessons  of 
History,  Art,  and  Literature. 

V.  I  BELIEVE  that  "Prayer"  is  simply  longing  for  a 
higher  type  of  existence  shown  by  labor,  by  aspiration,  by 
gratitude  to  men  and  women,  and  that  petitioning  address 
to  "God"  is  meaningless,  irrational,  and  insincere,  as  soon  as 
we  are  intelligent  enough  to  realize  the  immensity  of  the 
universe  and  the  irrevocableness  of  its  laws. 

VI.  I  BELIEVE  in  Mankind— the  highest  life  on  earth, 
born  in  lowliest  simplicity  (a  million  years  ago),  but  with 
"divine"  potentiality,  taught  by  experience,  with  the  ages 
ever  reaching  greater  results,  never  perfected,  always 
aspiring,  always  growing. 

VII.  I  BELIEVE  that  "Sin"  is  the  survival  or  residuum 
of  the  pre-human  and  early-human  life  breaking  out  anew 
and  becoming  conscious  in  after  thought ;  that  there  neither 
is  nor  was  any  bad  till  the  better  came ;  that  it  is  the  good 
in  sight  that  makes  the  existing  bad;  and  that  man's  real 
interest  is  in  the  problem  of  the  origin  of  the  good  rather 
than  in  the  origin  of  evil. 

VIII.  I  BELIEVE  that  Life  is  for  living,  that  living 


IF  WE  MUCT  HAVE  A  CREED  317 

is  growing,  that  growing  is  outgrowing;  that  "the  end  of  life 
is  growth,  and  that  the  end  of  growth  is  the  beginning  of 
death." 

IX.  I  BELIEVE  that  the  Ideal  Character  has  only  been 
intimated  by  the  sage  and  saintly  types  of  past  ages,  and 
that  no  character  of  far-away  times  is  a  sufficient  guide  or 
pattern  for  this  or  future  centuries. 

X.  I  BELIEVE  in  the  "Beatitudes  of  Jesus,"  and  in 
other  beatitudes  of  other  hves, — in  unlimited,  aggressive 
good-doing,  not  in  merely  avoiding  bad-doing;  that  the 
keeping  of  the  Decalogue  (commanding  things  Jiot  to  be 
done)  is  scarcely  the  beginning  of  character  and  personality. 

XI.  I  BELIEVE  in  the  Oneness  of  Nature,  so  also  in 
One  Human  Family,  biologically  and  ethnically  related,  im- 
pelled by  the  same  basic  instincts,  engaged  in  an  age-long 
diminishing  conflict,  more  and  more  perceiving  their  mutual 
dependence,  now  rapidly  learning  the  spirit  of  sympathy  and 
cooperation,  and  already  entering  upon  the  era  of  Human 
Federation. 

XH.  I  BELIEVE  that  Science  is  the  concensus  of  the 
investigators — the  latest  and  highest  phase  of  man's  devel- 
opment; and  that  its  exercise  in  social  relations  will  bring 
about  "the  union  of  all  who  love  in  the  service  of  all  who 
suffer." 

XHL  I  BELIEVE  that  the  best  possible  preparation 
toward  any  "Future  Life"  is  an  informed  personality— not 
a  selfish  yearning  or  a  credulous  sentimentalism ;  that  the 
fullest  present  life  will  find  the  truth  sooner  than  either 
idle  speculation  based  on  ancient  traditions,  or  shadowy 
seances  bewildered  by  legerdemain. 

XIV.  I  BELIEVE  that  "Heaven"  is  a  way  and  nf)t  a 
goal,  that  "Heaven"  and  "Hell"  have  no  legitimate  mcaniiig.s 
today,  except  as  states  of  mind  indeitcndcnt  of  place. 

XV.  I  BELH'LVIC  that  these  things  are  a  chief  part  of 
Religion  in  the  tiventieth  century. 

And  I   stand  ready  to  believe  in  any  discovery  or   fact 
that  careful,  scientific  investigation  may  formulate. 
With  kindl)-  suggestion. 


3i8    A   RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 
RETROSPECT  AND  PROSPECT 

OUR  RACIAL  PAST 

The    Scepter    of    World    Power    passed    into 

538  B.  C.     Ai-yaii  hands  at  the  Fall  of  Babylon,  when  the 

Semitic  Bel  Shazzer  fell  before  the  Persian  Cyrus 

leading  the  on-coming  hosts  of  a  rising  mightier 

race.     Thereafter,  Persian  glory  thought  to  live 

on  pride  of  former  days ;  and,  in  two  centuries 

of  luxury  and  infidelity,  it  lay  down  and  ignomin- 

331  B.  C.     iously  died  before  Alexander's  handful  of  Greeks. 

Arbela  ^^^^  [Yie  Hellenic  hand  was  even  then  trembling 

in  death.     The  Greeks  had  spent  their  "Golden 

Age."     Their   last   grand   character,   the   world- 

322  B.  C.      famed  Aristotle,  finished  his  life  just  after  Alex- 

ander the  Great  had  seated  himself  on  the  world- 

323  B.  C.     throne  at  Babylon.     Then,  in  a  debauch  of  glory, 

Alexander  too  died.  With  him  went  out  the 
flickering  life  of  all  the  former  5000  years  of 
Oriental,  Asiatic,  Semitic,  Persian,  and  Greek 
civilizations.  Greece  and  her  farcical  democratic 
glitter  sank  in  impotence.  Her  cynic  philoso- 
phers despoiled  but  did  not  replace  her  faith. 
.She  killed  and  exiled  her  potential  saviors.  A 
146  B.  C.  little  later  the  Romans  completed  the  wreck. 
And  then  the  memory  and  inspiration  of  her 
Socrates,  of  her  Platos,  and  of  her  Aristotles  had 
to  slumber  through  1500  years  before  they  rose 
again  to  rejuvenate  the  world. 

Meanwhile,    Westward    and    Northward    the 
sphere  of  empire  had  wended  its  way.     The  tiny 
After  Latin  kingdom  had  evolved  into  the  conquering 

509  B.  C.  Roman  Republic.  Once  more  Civilization  had 
grown  into  promise.  "The  grandeur  that  was 
Rome"  had  come  on.  Its  ruthless  ambition 
trampled  down  and  swayed  the  world.     It  ran  its 


IF  WE  MUCT  HAVE  A  CREED  319 

indifferent    course — 1200   years.      And    died   its    From 
ignoble  death — as  all  the  rest.  753  B.  c. 

The  hopes  of  a  hundred  ancient  nations  had   *°     . 
faded,  and  their  civilizations  lie  buried  beneath 
the  dust  of  centuries.     And  when  Rome  winked 
out,  a  thousand  years  of  arresting  blight  o'ertook 
mankind. 

Out  of  the  wreck  of  the  "Dark  Ages,"  at  last 
arose  many  petty  peoples.  The  greatness  of 
some  of  their  ancestral  kin,  preserved  in  long  lost  "IIOO  A.  D. 
manuscripts,  was  rediscovered ;  and  by  the  inspir-  ^"*^  *^**'^ 
ation  of  this  Hebrew-Greek-Roman  literature 
(which  to  European  Middle  Age  ignorance 
seemed  "sacred"  and  "classic"),  they  soon  out- 
grew those  very  thoughts  they  hugged  so  dearly. 

Since  the  ages  began  to  lighten,  Romanic  and    ■''*92  a.  d. 
Anglo-Saxon     peoples     have     vied     for    power. 
.Spanish-Romanic  won  first;  but  clung  with  blind- 
ing bigotry  to  the  rule  of  the  past — and  failed — 
in  one  short  century. 

Again  the  Scepter  Passed,  when  the  "Invincible    1588  a   D. 
Armada"  went  down.     We  Anglo-.Sa.xons  since 
have  borne  it  round  the  world.     No  sun  e'er  sets 
beyond  our  sway. 


OUR  POSSIBLE  FUTURE 

O  Yel-Great  Aryans!  Is  this  our  "Gol-len 
Age?"  And  are  we  l^eginning  "The  Decline  and 
Fall,"  as  Ciibbon  wrote  of  Rome?  .\  million 
hearts  are  anxious. 

Thousands  now  see  that  a  traitorous  few  have  1511  to 
long  been  imjxjrting  lower  races  to  clieajjen  labor.  1921  in 
The  mixture  is  alreadv  darkening  our  skin  and    Britiih 

..  I  I        I        T.    '•       ■       ■  I-         I  Empire 

palmg  our  blood.      It  is  insidiously  sapping  out     ^^^ 
Nordic  strength   and  bhirrint,'  our  mental  clear      United 
ness.  Statei 


320    A    RECEIVERSHIP    FOR    CIVILIZATION 


Religious,        More  thousands  see  that  for  professional  gain, 

Political,     ^i^g  Ij-aditionaHsts  have  long  been  refusing  proven 

tionai  facts.     They  have  preached  yesterday  notions  to 

since  propagate  prejudice  against  growth,  thus  robbing 

1543  most  of  the  race  of  their  birthright  of  continuous 

enlightenment.      And  now  that  their  "dear  old 

faiths"  are  fading  and  carrying  away  their  last 

exploiting  chance,  they  are  raising  tearful  alarms 

and  making  frantic  efforts  at  revival. 

"Failing"  !  Of  course — all  faiths  fail — mostly 
by  unworthy  collapse  and  decay  when  they  might 
have  developed  by  natural  growth  and  respectable 
evolution.  Only  new  faiths  urge  on  to  new  vic- 
tories. Only  faiths  kept  glowing  by  new  truths 
can  rouse  new  aspirations.  Only  while  growing 
purpose  lasts  do  nations  live. 

Why  then  must  every  glory  be  followed  by  dis- 
grace? Racial  decay  is  needless,  and  worse — it 
becomes  a  historical  scandal  for  all  time.  The 
Philosophy  that  made  Plato  original  and  grand 
and  wise  could  have  saved  his  precious  Athens. 
The  Ethics  that  singled  out  Seneca  for  our  ad- 
miration could  have  purified  the  Roman  domain. 
The  Beatitudes  that  glorified  Jesus  might  have 
renovated  the  formalism  of  Judea. 

But  they  did  not — and  why  ? — apathy  and  indi- 
vidualism among  the  thinkers  and  ignorance  and 
bigotry  among  the  controllers. 

Opportunity  Is  Yet  Ours.  Science  can  illume 
the  way.  The  hopes  of  all  races  center  in  it. 
The  world  is  an  unlimited  fount  of  progress.  We 
cannot  wish  beyond  its  capacity  to  supply. 

Enlightened  by  the  galaxy  of  scientific  achieve- 
ments, aur  Aryan  Race  can  lead  on  through  inde- 
finite ages  with  increasing  triumph.  Conference 
of  those  who  know  and  see  and  love  will  save  it, 
by  substituting,  always  and  everywhere,  the  newer 
modern  for  the  older  ancient. 


IF 


321 


INDEX 


Abbott,  Lyman,  291. 

Aben,   Ezra   (1167),   167. 

"Age  of  Science,"  10,  34. 

Alzog,   Historian,   51. 
Anglo-Saxons  and  Evolution,  10. 

Anselm,  59. 

Anthropology,    115.    116. 

Aquinas.   Thomas,   40. 

Archaeology,  35,  141. 

Aristotle.   50. 

Arnold  of  Brescia,  51. 

Aryan  Prospect,  319. 

Aryan  Retrospect,  318. 

Aryans    Developing    Their    Own 

Religion,  145. 
Astruc,   170. 

Authority  of  Former  Times.  153, 
181,  189. 

B 

Babylonian   Captivity.   179. 
Bacon.   Roger.   40. 
Baconian   Method,   109. 
Bagehot,   Walter.   302. 
Batchelor,    George,   233. 
Baur,    F.   C,    172. 
Beauties  of  Old  Bible,   153. 
Beecher,  Henry  Ward.  141. 
Bernard.  Saint,  51. 
Bible.  72.  79,  95. 
nible.  A  Literature,   Ifin. 
Bible,  as  Literature.  190. 
Bible  Authority,  189. 
Bible,   Beautlofl  of.   l.iJS. 
Bible   nentltudes.   159. 
nihle    Canon,    179. 
Bible      Crhoh      of      B«d       .\Tnial 
Teaching.  16.';. 


Bible  Chapters,  Verses.  154,  178. 

Bible  Dates.  180. 

Bible  Decalogue,  158. 

Bible  Earnestness,  155. 

Bible   God,    162. 

Bible,  Holy  and  Sacred.  187. 

Bible  Infallibility,  181. 

Bible  Inspiration,   183,   185. 

Bible  Language.   155.   178. 

Bible  Legends,   159. 

Bible,   Polychrome,   175. 

Bible  Proverbs.  157. 

Bible,  The  New.  191. 

Bible  Title,   177. 

Bible,  What  Is  It? 

When,  How,  Where?  176. 
Bible,  Why  Preach  About  It?  161. 
Bible   Revelation.   184,   186. 
Bible  Sacredness,   179.   187. 
Bible— "Word  of  Ood."  163. 
Bible.    Worshipful    Feature.    156. 
Blbl-lanlty.   33. 
Blbl-lolatry.  33. 
Biology,  116. 
Blumenbach.    118. 
Boccacio,  57. 
Brahmanlsm.   241. 
Breaking  Camp.  2Un. 
Bruno.  57. 
Buddhism.   241. 
BufTon,   lis. 
Riirton.   Richard.  Cni. 
Butta.   Mary  F..   210. 


Ciirionlzniloii,    104. 
CnpolluH,    169. 
rnrlKtnrtf.   66.    16R. 
Carlylp,    85. 
323 


3-24      A  RECEIVERSHIP  FOR  CIVILIZATION 


Carruth.    William    Herbert,    294. 

Chadwlck,  John  W.,   180. 

Chief  in  Early  Society,  122. 

Christian   Asceticism,   245. 

Christ-lanity,    31. 

Christianity  Capable  of  Ex- 
panding, 247. 

Christianity  Kxotic  to  Aryans, 
144. 

Christianity,  Psychology  of,  242. 

Christianity,  The  One  Social 
Religion,  245. 

Christ-iolatry,   32. 

Church  "A  coward  on  social 
problems,"  22. 

Church  Atavism.  290. 

Church   Diminishing,    15. 

Church  Doctrines  Greatest  Ob- 
stacle, 21. 

Church  Instruments,  267. 

Church  Needs  Saving,  262. 

Church    Opposing    Religion,    266. 

Church's  Reaction  A  Masterly 
Failure,    106. 

Church,  The  Ought-to-be,  264. 

Church.  A  Tribute  to,  14. 

Church-ianlty,  32. 

Classics,  35. 

Clement  VII,  45. 

"Clerical  Science,"   152. 

Collegiate  Preaching  Coming. 
271. 

Collegiate  Preaching,  The  Rem- 
edy, 280. 

Columbus,  34,  117,  140,  205. 

Constance,    Council  of,    49. 

Constantinople,  Fall  of.  57. 

Copernicus,  55.  79.  117.   140.  205. 

Creed  of  Science,  315. 

Curtain  Picture  Mistaken  for 
Drama,  136. 

Cusa,  Nicholas,  168. 


Dante.   57. 

Dante's  World-Outlook.  113. 

Darwin,  9. 

DeWette,  Theodore,  171. 


Disciplcshlp,  31. 
Dogmatism,  31. 
Drama  of  Christianity,  29. 
Drummond,  115. 


Early  Society,  122. 

Karth,  Development  of,  205. 

Fcclesiasticlsm,  33. 

Economic  Awakening,   84. 

Education,  63. 

Educators,  The  Great,  63. 

Edison,  Thomas,  293. 

Edward  III,  38. 

Eichhorn,  170. 

Eliot,  Samuel  A.,  286. 

Elizabethan  Age.   80. 

England  in   14th  Century,  38. 

Emerson.  29,  149,  150,  191,  221. 

Erasmus,   Desidarlus,   55,   168. 

"Essays  and  Reviews,"  172. 

Euripides,  146. 

Evil  Means  Unevolved,  220. 

Evil,   Nature  of,   146. 

Evil,  Old  Explanations,  214. 

Evil,  Problem  of,  212. 

Evolution  In  Forms,  277. 

Ewald,   171. 


Faber,  Frederick  W.,  230. 
Final  Outcome  of  Protest,  74. 
Five  Great  Acts,   29. 
F'orms  Retained,  130. 
Francis  of  Assisi,  51. 
Franklin,  165. 

Freedom-Rcllgion-Church,   257. 
Froude,  John  Anthony,  55. 
Funk,  W.  J..  310. 


Galileo,  77. 
Geddes,  Alex,  171. 
Geography   and  Geology^   202. 
Geology,   116,    209. 
Geology,   Divisions  of,   207. 
Geology,  Inspiration  of,  207. 


A  RECEIVERSHIP  FOR  CIVILIZATION      325 


Germans  Losing  Relieion,  9. 

German  Universities,  52. 

God,    36,    94,    129,    162.    185,    200. 

208.   209,   229.   231,  316. 
God  an  Avenger,  125. 
Good.  Origin  of.   219. 
Great  Schism.  33.  45. 
Grecianism.  242. 
Gregory  VII,  32. 
Gregory  XI,  43. 
Grimite.  58,  63. 
Griswold.   Hattie  Tyng,  206. 
Gunpowder,  34. 

H 

Haupt,   Paul.    175. 
Heliocentric   System.    197. 
Herder.   170. 
Higher  Criticism.  167. 
Higher  Critics.  List  of.  174. 
History,  Restudy  of.  82. 
Hobbes.    168. 

Hocking.   William   Ernest.   309. 
Holden.    J.    Stuart.    307. 
Holmes.  John  Haynes.  300. 
Hugo.  Victor.  239. 
Humboldt.  118,  140,  205. 
Hupfleld.  172. 
Hutten,  Ulrlch  von,  55. 
Hutton.  James.  118. 
Huxley.  Thomas  Henry.  93. 
Hyde.  Dewltt  C.  71. 

I 

Immortality,  Hope  of.  96. 
Ingersoll.   Hobort.   67. 
Innocent  HI.  32. 
"Inscrutable  Mysteries"  Solved. 

212. 
Irving,   David.   50. 
Itinerant   Preachers.   4fi. 


Jesus.   69.   73,   .117. 
Jesus  and  Chrlstlnnlty.  247. 
Jenufl — Neither       Prophet        nor 
Ralnt.  10.5. 


Jesu-anlty,   29. 
Jesu-olatry,   31. 
Jesuitism.  85. 
John  of  Gaunt.  44. 
John.   King.   38. 
Judaism.  242. 


Kant   and  Laplace.   108. 
Kepler,  55. 
Knox.  John.  62. 


Laing.   Samuel.   302. 

Lancaster.   Duke  of.   44. 

Language  Study.   78. 

Laws  of  Nature.  235. 

Lechler.  Prof.  G.  V..  38.  52. 

LeClerc.  Jean.   170. 

Leo   X.    64. 

Lines  of  Our  Survey.  25. 

Linnaeus.   118. 

Lord's  Supper.  WIclirs.  47. 

Loux.  DuBols  H..  292. 

Lowell,    256. 

Lubbock.  Sir  John  (Ixird  Avehury). 

302. 
Luther.  Martin.  22.  33.  45. 
L.vell.  108.   118.  142.   213. 

M 

.Nfacaulay.  84. 

Maes,    Andreas.    168. 

Magellnn.  34. 

Mankind    KearhlnK   Inlty.   304. 

Martin.   I'rcderick  Townwnd.  J93. 

MelnncthoM.   59. 

Middle  Ages.   80. 

Middle  Age  World-Outlook.  112.  113. 

Milton.  John,  5". 

Ministry.  Tho   Now.  270. 

Modern    SrI.nro    A    More    Advanced 

Protestantism.    12" 
Modern  ThlnkcTK    61. 
"Mornl  IiitcTr«>Kn«im."  10. 
Mnrnlltv.    Klndx   of.   521. 
Moral  Knnrtlnns.  222. 


326      A  RECEIVERSHIP  FOR  CIVILIZATION 


Moral  Sanctions,  Table  of,  237. 
Moral  Yard  Stick,  228. 

N 

Natural  Selection,   109. 
Natural  Theolog>-,   60. 
Nebular  Hypotliesis,  199. 
New  Bible,  The.  191. 
New  Bible — Book  1 — ^Astronomy, 

192,  195. 
New     Bible— Book    II— Geology, 

192,  202. 
New    Bible — Book    III — Physics 

and  Chemistry,  192. 
New    Bible— Book    IV— Biology, 

192. 
New  Bible — Book  V — Anthropo- 
logy, 193. 
New  Bible— Book  VI— Philology. 

193. 
New   Bible — Book   VII— Psycho- 
logy, 193. 
New  Bible— Book  VIII — Archae- 
ology &  History,   193. 
New  Bible— Book  IX— Sociology, 

193. 
New  Bible— Book  X— Esthetics, 

193. 
New  Bible — Book  XI— Religiolo- 

gy,  193,  200. 
New  Bible,  Many  Versions,  192. 
New  Bible,  Titles  of  Books,  192. 
New-Time  Needs,  121. 
New-Time    Preacher,    133,    136, 

153. 
Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  55. 
Newton.   R.   Heber,   153. 
Nlcea,  Council  of,  31. 
Noyes,  Alfred,  289. 

O 

Old  Bible,  Beauties  of,  153. 
Old  Bible,  What  Is  It?  176. 
Old-Time  Preacher,  121. 
Ominous  Social  Condition."?,  24. 
Origin  of  Priesthood,   123. 
Our  Age  Yet  Traditional,  137. 
Oxford  University,  39. 


Paine,  Thomas,  57. 

Papacy,  32. 

Parker,  Theodore.  171. 

Paul,  Saint,  73. 

Peasant  War,  47. 

Persianism,  242. 

Petitioning  Prayer,  236. 

Petrarch,   57. 

Philosophy    and    The    Reformation. 

76. 
Physics,  116. 
Plainer  Talk,   298. 
Planetesimal  Hypothesis,  199. 
Polychrome  Bible,  175. 
Prayer,  The  Aspiring,  237,  316. 
Prayer     and     Law     and     Common 

Sen.se,  232. 
Prayerless  Equally  Religious,   233. 
Prayer,   The  Petitioning,  236. 
Preacher  as  He  Ought  to  Be,  131. 
Preacher  Left  Behind,  131. 
Preacher's  Mission  in  Any  Age,  139. 
Preacher's  Mission  Today,  139. 
Preacher  Modern,  124. 
Preacher  A  Moral   Stimulator,   145. 
Preaching  Needed,  The,  296. 
Preaching  for  The  New-Time,  132. 
Preacher,  The  Old-Time,  121. 
Preacher  and  The  Past,  142. 
Priesthood  Beginnings,  123. 
Priestly  Functions,  126. 
Primitive   Man,    202. 
Printing,  34. 
Prophet,  The  New,  107. 
Prophets,  Old-Tlme,  94. 
Prophets.  S.'iints,  and  Scientists,  100. 
Prophetic     Institution     Disappears, 

102. 
Prospect,  Our  Racial,  319. 
Proto.st.    Beginning  of,   37. 
Protest,  The  Right  to.  258. 
Prote.st-ants.  33. 
Protestant  Sects,  87. 
Protestants,    I>atest   Organized,    89. 
Prote.st-nnts.  The  TTnorganlzed,  100. 
Prote.stanti.sm      Dropped      A      Few 
Errors,   129. 


A  RECEIVERSHIP  FOR  CIVILIZATION      327 


Protestantism,  Essence  of,  64. 
Protestantism,     Limitations     of, 

69. 
Protestantism,  The  Newest,  90. 
Puritanism,  The  Newest,  90. 
Puritanism,  66. 
Purposive  Selection,  109. 


Race    Awakening,    A    Northern, 
76. 

Reason,  Authority  of,  91. 

Redemption,  The  New,  231. 

Reformation,    A   Race   Awaken- 
ing, 80. 

Reformation,  Meaning  of,  17,  33, 
53,  55. 

Reformers,  62. 

Religion  Defined,  121. 

Religion   Growing  Anew,   266. 

Religion  is  Idealization,  264. 

Religion    Natural,    93. 

Religion    is    Noble    Earnestness, 
264. 

Religions,  Different  Values,  243. 

Religions,       Incompleteness      of 
Each,   243. 

Religions,  Psychologj'  of,  241. 

Religious     Reconstruction     Urg- 
ent, 289. 

Renaissance,  58,  128. 

Retrospect.  Our  Racial,  318. 

Reuchlln.  78. 

Reuss.    172. 

RevJval.s  Only  Reiteration,  302. 

Richard  II,  44. 


Saints,   103. 

Sample  Close-ups.  299. 

Savage.  Mlnot  J.,   211. 

Sclenro,   34.   315. 

Sclonce  of  Thp  Ancients.  76. 

Science  and  Chararfor,  109. 

Science,   Modern.   76. 

Srlpnre,   No  Tlotinrtn.   119. 

Srifnco.    Thr   OrdorH   of,    CfiO. 

Srifnro.    Ordorji   I.nrklnfT.   251. 


Science-Prophets.  106. 

Science,  Reconstruction  by,  27. 

Science  Replacing  Tradition,  142. 

Scientific  Doctrine  Imperative,  289. 

Scientific  Movement  Began.  8. 

Scieniiilc  Movement.  80. 

Scientific  Reticence  Dangerous.  306. 

Scientists.  An  Appeal  to.  310. 

Scientists'  Creed,  315. 

Sercombe,  Parker,  303. 

Servetus,  66. 

Simon,   Richard,   169. 

Sin,  Genesis  Story,  212. 

Smith,    Prof.   Qoldwin,    10. 

Spencer,   195. 

Spinoza,   58.   168. 

Spirits.  Good  and  Bad.   213. 

Stars,  To  the  Ancients.   197. 

Stars.  To  the  Moderns.  197. 

Steele.  Joel  Dorman.  202. 

Stephanus.    169.    178. 

Strauss.  172. 

T 
Talbot.  E.  Guy.  308. 
Tennyson,  99. 

Theocracy  to  Democracy.  126. 
Transition  to  Modern  TImeji,  114. 
Trent.  Counrll  of.  56. 
Tribute  to  The  Church.  14. 


T'nchurchod    Masses.    15. 
Unchurched.   Retiwona  for,   17. 
Unchurched.  Typos  of.   17. 
Unltnrlanlsm.   66.   90. 
Universe.  128.  200.  234. 
Universe.  The  New,  2S4. 
Urban  V,   41. 
ITrban  VI.  45. 
TTiher.    Archlilshop.   137. 

V 

Vanminrd  ProwpectB.  161. 
Vntke.  171. 
Vennllus    107.   im. 
Vlllers.  8S. 
Voltnlre.   57. 
Von  Unnke.  Ifl.'. 


328      A  RECEIVERSHIP  FOR  CIVILIZATION 


w 

Walslngham,  Thomas,  51. 

Wanted,  312. 

Werner,  118. 

West,  James  H.,  195. 

White.  Andrew  D.,  1C9.  194. 

Wlcllf,  John,   38,   41,   45. 


Wllberforce,  Bishop,  173. 
Wlnchell,  Alexander.  202. 
Wordsworth,  49. 
World-Outlook,  The  New,  111, 
World -Out  look.   The  Old.   111. 
World  War's  Causes,  9. 
Worship.   The  Coming,  247. 
Worship,  Old  and  New,  240. 


115. 


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